News and Events

ISL Members who have accepted NASA 2024 Scholarships and NSA Internships

NASA Space Grant: MSI STEM Bridge Scholarship

Recipients: Anthony Gardner, Miriam Delgado, Morgan Shortt, Paul Rodriguez

Award Amount: $5000 Scholarship. One part awarded around end of Dec and second part awarded after May upon approval of Final Essay

Requirements:
-Fall Web Seminar and Information Session Attendance.
-Application to NASA Internship Program.
-Conduct Research according to NASA Mission Directorates.
-Interview faculty Member who teaches/conducts STEM Research.
-Submit a final report concerning the requirement tasks.

NSA 2024 Internship

Interns: Ashley Sutherland

Paid Salaried Intern
-Collaborate with a team of programmers and data scientists to help identify shortcomings
-Filtered and organized large amounts of data in a more readable format
-Discovered new techniques and use of graphing tools that improved organization and conciseness of writing code
-Utilized tools such as Jupyter Notebook for the development and organization of notebooks that aided in the graphical visualization of corporate data analysis
-Learned valuable skills and made Connections within NSA

ISL Members Earn Scholarships from the HDAA

Anita Amofah, Carrington Pearson and Ashley Sutherland of the Intelligent Systems Laboratory at FSU have received scholarships from the Healthcare Data and Analytics Association (HDAA).

To know more check the LinkedIn Article here.

ISL Students Summer Internship Experiences

Ashley Sutherland

National Security Agency

During the summer of 2024 I was able to participate in a summer internship with the National Security Agency. Through my internship I collaborated with a team of programmers and data scientists to help identify shortcomings and solve problems within the organization by applying my knowledge of the Python Pandas library to filter and organize large amounts of data that resulted in a more readable format to aid in decision making. I was able to refine my programming skills by discovering new techniques and use of graphing tools that improved organization and conciseness of writing code. I also utilized tools such as Jupyter Notebook for the development and organization of notebooks that aided in the graphical visualization of corporate data analysis tools which led to a better understanding of the importance of each tool and their dependencies. Overall, my internship was a very positive experience, and I am excited to hopefully be able to return as a summer intern next year. I have learned many valuable skills and made great connections within the agency that I hope to carry with me into my career, post-graduation.

Luis Hernandez

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

I am Luis E. Hernandez and I did a summer internship with NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In this internship, I worked on a project entitled "Using Machine Learning to Monitor Tropical Trees from Space" under the mentorship of Dr. Gary Doran. For this project, we worked with collaboration of several data scientists and ecologist from other research institutions such as the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. The main goal of our project was to develop a model that is able to detect and monitor tree species based on phenological factors such as flowering events, fruiting events, leafing events, and deciduousness. This will allow the scientific community to better monitor Earth's overall biodiversity and see how climate change can affect the lifecycle of tropical trees.

My main task for this project included testing out various methods, both supervised and unsupervised, in visualizing and filtering data. Our dataset is composed of satellite images and masks of a tropical forest canopy in Panama. This dataset was provided by Planet. I used Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding (t-SNE) to try and visualize and do some basic filtering of the dataset. I also implemented a machine learning based approach to filtering the data by using dinoV2 to extract image embeddings from our dataset and use said embeddings to train a model, RadomForestClassifier.  We then compared this result to a baseline Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and found that the machine learning approach performed better than the baseline test. With this result, we hope to use this machine learning approach to better filter out data and to also possibly use it to classify data and have the model detect phenological events in tree canopies.

Jonathankeith Murchison

Minority Serving Cyberinfrastructure Consortium

I was selected to participate in the Minority Serving Cyberinfrastructure Consortium (MS-CC) Climate Science Research Internship at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore (UMES). My research focused on analyzing the correlation between asthma incidence and varying levels of PM2.5 pollution across different income areas from 2008 to 2017, with an emphasis on seasonal variations. As part of this internship, I had the opportunity to attend the PEARC24 Conference in Rhode Island, where I gained valuable insights into current advancements in the field. At the conclusion of the summer, I presented our research findings through both an oral and poster presentation at a symposium.

Carrington Pearson

Department of Energy DOE Savannah River Site

This past summer, I completed an internship at the DOE Savannah River Site as a cybersecurity intern. During this time, I engaged in hands-on experience with cybersecurity protocols, participating in Capture The Flag competitions and conducting vulnerability assessments. I collaborated with cross-functional teams to enhance network security, ensuring the protection of critical infrastructure. This internship allowed me to apply and expand my knowledge in a real-world setting, bridging the gap between academic theory and practical application.

Sini Santino

Future Computing NSA

I participated in the Future Computing Summer Internship for the Laboratory of Physical Science at the NSA. We were mentored by NSA staff as we carried out research within the field of High-Performance Computing (HPC). My project at first focused on testing mathematical algorithms for primality in a distributed environment using the Rust programming language. Later, the focus shifted to adding graph theory methods to the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory's Lamellar HPC library for Rust.

Natalie Griffin

Department of Defense

This summer, I worked as an intern in the DoD HBCU/MI 2024 Summer Internship Program, focusing on two key projects: Review Forge and Wing Walker. For Review Forge, I collaborated with a team of software engineers to author a detailed white paper that explored foundational AI technologies, such as Large Language Models (LLMs) like LLaMA3 and algorithms like XLNet, to automate performance reviews, making the process faster and more consistent. I played a significant role in selecting technologies that would enhance the automation and accuracy of performance reviews.

For the Wing Walker project, I applied semantic segmentation techniques to point cloud datasets and developed algorithms to enhance object detection capabilities. I implemented models like PTv3 and PPT for better segmentation and applied clustering algorithms and bounding boxes to measure distances between vehicles in the SemanticKITTI dataset, aiming to improve accuracy and operational safety on naval flight decks. These experiences deepened my understanding of AI's role in naval operations and enhanced my technical skills in AI development and implementation

Matthew Wilkerson

O-RISE Department of Homeland Security

I performed an internship under O-RISE's Department of Homeland Security Summer Research Team. My task was to experiment with machine learning algorithms to hindcast missing monthly-mean water values belonging to a dataset produced by water level sensors stationed throughout the East Coast, Gulf of Mexico, and Puerto Rico and Virgin Islands. The monthly-mean dataset feeds into a larger meteorological model, and hindcasting missing values should increase the meteorological model's accuracy. I optimized, trained, and evaluated several machine learning algorithms, including Random Forest models, boosted tree models, linear regression models, and support vector machines, culminating with implementing ensemble models, such as Voting Regressors, Bagging Regressors, and Stacking Regressors.

Taylor Brown

O-RISE Department of Homeland Security<

During my internship with the DHS ORISE facility, I focused on improving the quality and completeness of water level monitoring data across the US East Coast, Gulf of Mexico, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. My main objective was to address missing data in time series datasets, crucial for accurate environmental monitoring and coastal hazard management. I developed a comprehensive framework combining pragmatic and advanced machine learning techniques to calculate distances between sensors, analyze correlations, and assess relative intensity. These methods were key to identifying and filling data gaps, ensuring the accuracy and reliability of the datasets. I also visualized the results through maps and correlation matrices, providing insights into spatial relationships. This experience deepened my understanding of data imputation and machine learning models, particularly in environmental contexts, and honed my skills in data analysis tools.

Lucinkey Lucien

North Carolina Information Technology Department

During my summer internship with the North Carolina Information Technology Department (NCDIT), I had the opportunity to work with the Enterprise Application team at the NC Department of Transportation (NC DOT). In my role as a project manager and business analyst, I contributed to a significant project aimed at overhauling the DMV's current system, transitioning from DB2 to a cloud-based platform. This project also involved improving the applications and services provided by the DMV, ensuring they meet modern standards and enhance user experience.

Anita Amofah

Peake

During my Peake internship in the summer of 2024, I conducted in-depth research on small businesses across the United States, helping them harness AI and big data tools to remain competitive with large enterprises. I also contributed to federal contracting efforts, where I worked closely with these businesses to strengthen their cybersecurity posture and foster sustainable growth. In addition, I delivered detailed briefings to business personnel, offering actionable strategies to enhance their search engine optimization (SEO), improve digital visibility, and drive more traffic to their online platforms. This experience allowed me to develop strong research, consulting, and communication skills while supporting the growth of small businesses in various industries.

Matt Wilkerson presents research at DATAWorks 2024 and the 3rd Annual Student Research Symposium

ISL (Intelligent Systems Laboratory) Member Matthew Wilkerson held a presentation “Advancing Edge AI: Benchmarking ResNet50 for Image Classification on Diverse Hardware Platforms”, co-authored with fellow JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) Researchers.

More information can be found here

ISL Director continues funded collaborator with NC State’s Laboratory for Analytic Sciences (LAS)

Sambit Bhattacharya, Ph.D., a computer science professor at Fayetteville State University, has embarked on a collaborative research initiative with the Laboratory for Analytic Sciences (LAS) at NC State University to advance artificial intelligence for national security purposes. Bhattacharya's project, funded for the second consecutive year, focuses on developing AI software capable of detecting rare and uncommon objects in video footage, catering to the needs of the National Security Agency (NSA).

More info can be found on this article here

Interdisciplinary Faculty team awarded grant for research on AI applied to Health Equity

A team of faculty members from various departments at Fayetteville State University has secured a $100,000 grant from the Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) Consortium to Advance Health Equity and Researcher Diversity (AIM-AHEAD). Collaborating with ISL Director Sambit Bhattacharya, Ph.D., the team aims to enhance research capacity in AI applied to Health Equity. Collaborating across computer science, biology, and nursing disciplines, they plan to utilize AI technology to analyze large healthcare datasets and address disparities in minority healthcare. With a focus on creating a comprehensive network of scholars and practitioners, the team aims to establish an AI Lab on Health Equity, facilitating workshops and symposia to identify research thrusts, gaps, and technological methods. This initiative aligns with the AIM-AHEAD consortium's goal of leveraging AI to improve health equity, with funding primarily provided by the National Institutes of Health.

More info can be found here

ISL Student and Faculty Accomplishments in 2023: a Year in Review

Student Accomplishments

• Adriel Alvarez-Collazo

US Army Internship

• Ahzsa Strange

NSA Internship
LAS symposium Presenter

• Anita Amofah

FSU Pre-MacNair Program Acceptance

• Antonio Ball

MITTC Finalist

• Ashley Sutherland

NSA internship
LAS symposium Presenter

• Carley Brinkley

MITTC Finalist
Emerging Researchers Network 2024 Conference Presenter

• Carrington Pearson

National Cybersecurity Alliance HBCU Scholarship

• Catherine Spooner

LAS symposium Presenter

• Garrett Davis

Emerging Researchers Network 2024 Conference Presenter

• Garrett Sheireiff

McNair Scholars Program Acceptance, NC Space Grant MSI STEM Bridge Scholarship
MITTIC Finalist

• Givante Lewis

LAS symposium Presenter

• Jeremy Graves

NC Space Grant MSI STEM Pathways Scholarship

• Laura DeSantis

Paychex Job Offer
Emerging Researchers Network 2024 Conference Presenter

• Leviticus Lintag

NC Space Grant MSI STEM Bridge Scholarship
MITTC Finalist

• Matthew Wilkerson

2024 FBI Internship
NC Space Grant MSI Bridge Scholarship
National Cybersecurity Alliance HBCU Scholarship
MITTIC Finalist

• Natalie Griffin

Winning entry to Final round of the HBCU xTECH competition

• Nathan Couch

UCF Grad School Admission Offer

• Oumar Toure

MITTC Finalist

• Paul Rodriguez

NC Space Grant MSI STEM Pathways Scholarship
MITTIC Finalist

• Tivon Brown

LAS symposium Presenter

• Toby White

NC Space Grant MSI STEM Pathways Scholarship

Faculty Accomplishments

• Sambit Bhattacharya

UNC Board of Governors award for Excellence in Teaching
Dr. Bhattacharya has been honored by the UNC Board of Governors Award for Excellence in Teaching
Links for more info: Article 1 , Article 2 , Article 3

Part-time Visiting Scientist at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
Dr. Bhattacharya has been appointed as part-time Visiting Scientist at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA). Under this appointment he will work with NGA researchers to solve complex problems faced by the agency in the application of Artificial Intelligence to GEOINT. Geospatial intelligence, or GEOINT is the exploitation and analysis of imagery and geospatial information to describe, assess and visually depict physical features and geographically referenced activities on the Earth. GEOINT consists of imagery, imagery intelligence and geospatial information

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FSU Finalist Team at NASA MITTC

May 2, 2023

A team from FSU became a finalist in NASA’s MUREP Innovation and Technology Tech Transfer Idea Competition (MITTC), against six other teams all in pitching business plans on NASA-originated technology.
The FSU’s team business plan was to create ASAPA: an autonomous swarm drone for solar panel maintenance, automation, and transport.
You can see FSU’s ASAPA Team Project Introduction here and information about the competition at this article.

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Dr. Bhattacharya wins the 2023 UNC Board of Governors Excellence in Teaching Award

APRIL 28, 2023

Fayetteville State University in North Carolina congratulates Dr. Sambit Bhattacharya, a professor in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, for receiving the 2023 Excellence in Teaching Award from The University of North Carolina Board of Governors. He is one of 17 faculty members from public universities in North Carolina who have been honored with this award. The recipients were nominated by committees at their respective institutions and chosen by the Board of Governors Committee on Educational Planning, Policies, and Programs.
The award includes a commemorative bronze medallion and a cash prize of $12,500 for each winner. A future ceremony will be held at each recipient's institution to honor their achievements.
For more information read:
UNCFSU article
Award Recipients
University Awards

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Igniting Curiosity: Reedy Creek Middle School Outreach on AI and NASA's Artemis Mission

April 18, 2023

Reedy Creek Middle School hosted an outreach event that aimed to introduce their students to Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, and their correlation with space exploration. Dr. Bhattacharya and his team from Fayetteville State University shared insights on their research and NASA's Artemis space mission. The event successfully sparked curiosity among the students, helping them gain a deeper understanding of the dynamic relationship between science, AI, and space discovery.
More information about the outreach can be found at the Reedy Creek Middle School's Facebook.

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FSU TO HOST AN ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND CYBERSECURITY HACKATHON

February 24 – 26, 2023

Fayetteville State University will host a Hackathon from Feb 24 - 26, 2023 where students can participate to solve homeland security issues in "real-world" designed intelligence and cybersecurity scenarios.
This event is in partnership with Arizona State University (ASU) and is funded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to help maintain an active pipeline of new homeland security professionals.
For more information visit the University’s LinkedIn and news site.

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NC Space Grant Pathways and Bridge Scholars Announced!

December 2, 2022

The 2022-23 recipients of the Minority Serving Institution (MSI) STEM Bridge Scholarship and of the MSI STEM Pathways Scholarship Program have been formally announced! Representing Fayetteville State University, MSI STEM Bridge Scholars includes Antonio Ball, Carley Brinkley, Khali Crawford, Morgan Jackson, Deneen Royal, and Antwaun Tune. Also from Fayetteville State University, MSI Stem Pathways Scholars includes Ashley Sutherland. Congratulations to all the recipients for your achievements, through your continued hardwork and perseverance.
More information about each students success and can be found from the following article.

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FSU COMPUTER SCIENCE STUDENTS’ NASA EXPERIENCE LEADS TO NEW BUSINESS VENTURE

November 22, 2022

FSU Computer Science students and alumni have started a new business venture after going through NASA’s Minority Serving Institutions Space Accelerator program during the summer. With the NASA Innovation Corps (I-Corps) Pilot Program Grant they are looking for potential partners in this entrepreneurial project.
Sambit Bhattacharya serves as the Principal Investigator and Technical Lead.
Daniel Rundell is the Entrepreneurial Lead.
For more information visit the University’s LinkedIn and news site.

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North Carolina Defense Summit: Academic Research Panel

Dr. Bhattacharya was a panelist at the North Carolina Defense Summit which was held in Raleigh, NC on September 27th 2022. Other professors from the University of North Carolina System and professionals working in defense related research were members of the panel. Dr. Bhattacharya spoke about best practices for collaboration between the Department of Defense (DoD) and universities on Artificial Intelligence research. He also listed some best practices for the DoD when working with Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) like Fayetteville State University. More information about the summit can be found here.

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Fayetteville State University Receives Funding From North Carolina Collaboratory

Dr. Sambit Bhattacharya recently received from the Collaboratory for his research on Artificial Intelligence (AI) drone software that aims to improve drone performance in confined and geographically complex areas during AI-led search operations. You can read more about their experience from the following article.

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Fayetteville State University Students’ NASA Experience Leads to Potential Business

ISL students recently returned from a trip to California where they visited NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. While there, they also had the opportunity to meet with potential investors and mentors from NASA. During this trip they learned about patenting new technologies, writing grant proposals, and telling the “story” of their concepts. You can read more about their experience both from NASA’s press release and Fayetteville State's press release. You may also hear an interview with Dr. Bhattacharya and ISL students Grace Vincent and Khali Crawford with this link to the podcast. Their section of the interview starts at about the sixteen minute mark.

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Fayetteville State Student Research Team Presents Winning Design in NASA’s University Student Design Challenge 2021-2022

Two students from Fayetteville State's Intelligent Systems Lab, Laura DeSantis and Kyle Schultz, and NCSU student Chris Arsenault, alongside their FSU faculty advisor, Sambit Bhattacharya, Ph.D, travelled to NASA’s Glenn Research Centers to present their winning project: “Improving the Design of Heat Exchangers with Artificial Intelligence.” Read more from university news site.

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NASA Selects Minority-Serving Institution Proposals to Receive Support

The awardees in the first MSI Space Accelerator have been announced after a competitive application process in which they were encouraged to think like startup businesses. Fayetteville State's Intelligent Systems Laboratory included amongst winners with our proposal, “Autonomous Systems With On-Demand Inference From Perception Pipelines”. Read more from Jet Propulsion Laboratory news site

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Our Team Won at NASA's MSI Space Accelerator Final!

Great news! A team from our lab has been awarded seed money and immersion in a training program for creating a startup by commercializing research results. Read more from university LinkedIn and news site.

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NSF Award for Trustworthy and Socially Responsible AI

Recent progress in AI, the digital transformation of work and human communication has created a wide range of possible applications of AI. While it will take more time and effort to realize its full potential these areas, the risks of adopting AI are an urgent and important problem because it can potentially cause harm when it is prematurely deployed before being tested for trustworthiness. Our lab has received grant funding from the National Science Foundation to pursue research and education on trustworthy and socially responsible AI. Read more from university LinkedIn post and news site.

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Telvin Vann and Elijah Bryant completed their Senior Design with co-advisors from LAS/DoD

The Laboratory for Analytic Sciences (LAS) partnered with Dr. Sambit Bhattachayra, Professor of Computer Science at Fayetteville State University (FSU) and students enrolled in a Computer Science Senior Design course to devise a rendering engine that generates synthetic data on rare objects to improve the robustness of computer vision models for object detection. With the mentorship of the LAS team and Dr. Bhattacharya, the senior design students programmatically rendered over 4000 objects, including variations such as differences in object angles, shades and environments, thus dramatically increasing training datasets for objects that are underrepresented or not represented at all in an existing dataset. To demonstrate the outcome of the rendering engine, the FSU senior design students and Dr. Bhattacharya were invited to the LAS to present their research on synthetic data generation to over 100 members in the U.S. Department of Defense. This gave the senior design students the opportunity to showcase their talents on AI/ML, critical thinking, applying advanced technological approaches to problem-solving and assisted with developing a capability of significant size and impact to the U.S. Department of Defense.

Fayetteville State University Spring 2022 Computer Science senior design students and Dr. Sambit Bhattacharya, Professor of Computer Science, visited the Laboratory for Analytic Sciences to present their research to the U.S. Department of Defense (June 2022)

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Graduate School and Scholarships for Students, Summer 2022

Congratulations to Grace Vincent for admission to PhD in Electrical Engineering at NC State University. She has been awarded full financial support and the Provost's Fellowship!
Congratulations to Ejijah Bryant for admission to MS in Computer Engineering at NC State University.
Congratulations to Carley Brinkley for scholarship award from the Grace Hopper Conference.

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Internship Offers for Students, Summer 2022

Congratulations to the following students for being selected for internships:
Grace Vincent and Jonathan Soltren: Jet Propulsion Lab, NASA
Nathan Couch: Johnson Space Center, NASA
Ahad Qureshi: SAS Institute Inc.
Antwaun Tune: Lenovo Inc.
Gabriel Ohmes, Khali Crawford, and Laura DeSantis: Naval Research Laboratory
Elijah Bryant: Laboratory of Analytical Science at NC State University
Daniel Bigler and Carley Brinkley: North Carolina Department of Transportation
Deneen Royal, Jack Santini, and Catherine Spooner: Corvid Technologies

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Team AERISS Goes to the Final Round of the NASA MITTIC 2022 Competition!

Congratulations to the MITTIC team and well deserved after months of hard work in preparing for the competition. Read more from university LinkedIn post here.

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Fayetteville State Graduate Grace Vincent admitted to Doctorate Program at NCSU

23 June 2022

Fayetteville State University and ISL alumna Grace Vincent will continue her studies at North Carolina State University as an Electrical Engineering Ph.D. student. She will be studying and researching applications for Machine Learning, Pattern Recognition, and Computer Vision. Additionally, she was awarded the Provost's Doctoral Fellowship which will cover her tuition and an excess of 30k will be used to fund her research. In the meantime, she is spending the Summer at an internship with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory as a Computer Vision Intern working with Martian image segmentation.

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DANC S&T Forum with Presentations from Vector Analytics and Fayetteville State University

Dr. Bhattacharya will present on “Use-inspired Research in AI/ML at the Intelligent Systems Lab” at the Science & Technology Forum of the Defense Alliance of North Carolina. The agenda is available here

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Update on ISL Student Accomplishments

SNCURCS attendance

Khali Crawford will be attending and presenting at the SNCURS (State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium) about the construction and functions of a semi-autonomous robotic tank swarm. This tank swarm would be used for exploration and terrain mapping utilizing Ultra-Wide Broadband sensors and satellite overhead. This project would assist NASA Artemis Mission, a NASA project to return to the moon by 2024.

ASGSR attendance

Ahad Qureshi attended the ASGSR (American Society for Gravitational and Space Research) conference. The conference led the discussion of plans of returning to the moon, the development of sustainable lunar habitation, and preparing the moon as a base for the exploration of Mars. The topic the conference used as the focus to achieve the aforementioned goals was space biology, the study of biology when exposed to the effects of deep space for a long duration of time.

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North Carolina Department of Transportation Research & Innovation Summit – 2021

Dr. Bhattacharya presented on the topic of “Deep Learning Software for Traffic State Prediction” at the Summit hosted by the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center. The recorded presentation is available under “NC Transportation Center of Excellence on Mobility and Reducing Congestion” on the agenda page

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Dr. Bhattacharya was a speaker at the TechNet Symposium