Research Groups

WPI Computer Science research is nurtured by its research groups. Each group holds regular meetings to discuss current research topics and results (See the Summary of Research Group Meeting Times). Several research groups operate their own laboratories with gifts, grants or contracts from outside agencies. A mailing list is operated for each group. The list name is indicated by the letters after the name of each group (e.g., AIRG). CS Department publications can be requested by sending email to research@cs.wpi.edu. Other research publications are listed in the descriptions of research groups and on faculty home pages.

Applied Logic and Security Group (ALAS)

Profs. Dougherty & Fisler.

The ALAS group explores various problems related to logic, software engineering, software verification, security, and programming languages.

Artificial Intelligence Research Group (AIRG)

Profs. Brown, Gennert, Heffernan, Rich & Ruiz.

AIRG members share interests in the theory and applications of knowledge-based systems. Current research includes intelligent tutoring systems, intelligent design, machine learning, multi-agent systems, intelligent interfaces, and data mining.

Collaboration & Creativity Support Research Group (CCSRG)

Prof. Pollice.

The CCSRG is interested in understanding how technology can be used to support collaboration and creativity. It is open to all graduate and undergraduate students at WPI, as well as interested faculty. Meetings are discussion oriented. We will select relevant papers to review and encourage members to work on projects that will further research on collaboration and creativity. Research questions will be identified that can be pursued as MQPs, or graduate projects and theses.

Congestion Control (CC)

Profs. Claypool & Kinicki.

The CC research group investigates research issues in Internet congestion control. It is a discussion-oriented group, where related papers are chosen each week and discussed.

Database Systems Research Group (DSRG)

Prof. Rundensteiner & Mani.

DSRG (Database Systems Research Group) is a subgroup of the larger DKBRG (Data/Knowledge Base Research Group). It is composed of Prof. Rundensteiner and all students in the Computer Science Department, or other departments at WPI, that work with her on database and software systems research projects.

Human Interaction in Virtual Environments (HIVE)

Prof. Lindeman

This group is concerned with the study of vibrotactile feedback for use in Human-Computer Interaction. We are using a holistic approach: providing feedback to multiple senses in concert to improve the use of the high bandwidth of which humans are capable during real interactions. Virtual environment research is one of the areas that we see as having great promise as a technological framework for supporting simulation (e.g., surgical, military), collaboration, communication, and visualization.

Human-Robot Interaction (HRI)

Prof. Rich

If human-like robots are ever going to move freely among us, we will need to understand how to program them to collaborate with us smoothly and naturally. Our research spans robotics, artificial intelligence, computational linguistics and human-computer interaction.

Image Science Research Group (ISRG)

Profs. Agu, Claypool, Gennert & Ward.

The ISRG conducts interdisciplinary research into the theory and application of graphics, visualization, image processing and computer vision techniques. The group's current projects include data and information visualization, visual data mining, stereo vision, medical image processing, tomography, modeling of natural phenomena, and appearance modeling.

(Also see: Center for Research in Exploratory Data and Information Analysis)

Knowledge Discovery and Data mining (KDDRG)

Prof. Ruiz.

KDDRG conducts research in data mining, machine learning, and knowledge discovery in databases. Current research projects include applications of data mining to e-commerce, sequence mining, analysis of genomic data, and web mining.

(Also see: Center for Research in Exploratory Data and Information Analysis)

Mobile Graphics Research Group (MGRG)

Prof. Agu.

MGRG is investigating architectures and techniques that enable high-end servers to assist heterogeneous mobile hosts in rendering large geometric models. Wireless networked graphics applications are becoming more pervasive on mobile devices. Computer graphics applications are computationally intensive and resource hungry, while mobile devices have limited resources, low bandwidths and high error rates.

Performance Evaluation of Distributed Systems (PEDS)

Profs. Agu, Finkel, Claypool, Kinicki & Wills.

PEDS is interested in the design and analysis of distributed systems, with a special focus on the performance of distributed operating systems.

Software Engineering Research Group (SERG)

Profs. Heineman, Fisler & Rundensteiner.

The Software Engineering Research Group (SERG) meets to discuss issues related to the discipline of Software Engineering. SERG has several goals: to provide a forum for discussion of the research of group members; to attract graduate students and prospective MQPs in Software Engineering; and to generate new areas of software engineering research.

THeory Umbrella Group (THUG)

Profs. Dougherty, Fisler, & Selkow.

THUG is a group dedicated to the discussion of theory. The group meets each week for the Theory Seminar, which features talks on all aspects of theoretical computer science. Students and faculty in all areas of computer science are welcome to participate.

Tutor Research Group (TRG)

Prof. Heffernan.

TRG researches intelligent tutoring systems and tutoring strategies.

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Several Research Groups are currently not active. Their coordinators should be contacted for further information.