Friday, April 13, 2007
Bikes and phdcomics
Can totally identify with the following two comics - One depicts the commonplaceness of bike thefts and the other the disadvantages of biking with 'normal' pants with possible remedies. Now, if I can get a tape, that would be nice....
Sunday, April 8, 2007
The interdisciplinary approach to research
Note: This article reflects my views alone. My views as would also be yours, change with time and hence this article reflects my current understanding of the approach to research.
Introduction
When I heard from a friend that the civil engineering department at the University of California Davis encourages its students to take courses from other departments such as Applied Math department, it made a lot of sense to me. Transportation Engineering, a sub-division of Civil Engineering is an application oriented field. But what tools are you going to use for approaching transportation problems? Say I need to design, route and schedule a rail transit network in Seattle, my main goals for such a problem/project would be to capture as much segment of the population as possible, all the while minimizing travel, operation and maintenance costs. It is easy to see that this problem can formulated as an optimization problem where you optimize(minimize or maximize) certain objectives: Say minimize travel costs or cost of design and build or maximize the number of people served. You can also have a multiple objectives that are minimized or maximized simultaneously - Talk about multi-objective optimization and you are talking about a HOT field in Operations Research. You see how Math and Transportation are intricately linked now? How do you expect Transportation Engineers to make effective decisions if the tools(software, analysis tools, etc) they use are not catching up with the developments in Applied Math for instance.
The right approach?
You don't have to look at what's going on in terms of research at the Math department, you wouldn't understand it anyway, not to say anything about applying it to engineering. But how about applied math research, these guys have a solid Math background and they are looking to use this background to solve problems in Engineering.
Now when they start doing that, engineers need to stop doing whatever they are doing and seriously consider how their contribution to research might be enhanced by collaborating with the Applied Math guys. Engineers especially in an application oriented field like Transportation are at an advantage in terms of data, since considerable amount of time is spent in data collection efforts through stated preference surveys, house-hold interviews, etc. Transporataiton engineers also spend a considerable time formulating a problem since a real-world problem isn't that easy to formulate into a known model that can be analysed. On the other hand people in the Math Department need a problem. They start with a problem and analyse it to no end or let's say till they reach the end...the end of the proof to a theorem!
It is a kind of startling realisation that researchers in Math and Engineering streams are looking at the same puzzle at the macroscopic level, but since research is always at the microscopic level, the microcsomic worlds of Mathematicians and Engineers seem different.
The need for collaboration
So we have the problem features, problem formulation and data collection on one side and you have analytical tools, methodologies an problem solving on the other side. But everything here has to do with one word - Problem . That's what's troubling everyone. There seems to be a problem or is there? - the engineers crib. Ha, this problem you have given me is interesting and challenging, is the mathematicans exclamaton.
Piecing together what the Engineers and Mathematicians talk about, it can be seen that collaboration would make more sense since one can combine the methodology and tools from the App Math dept with the experience in data collection and problem formulation from the Engineering side and the results would be: a) Practical since the data being analysed is from the real world b) Have a sound methodological backing c) Pave the path for continuous innovation due to the very nature of such a collaboration.
This kind of thinking, though abstract, in the end, if I may be a tad more idealistic, would lead one to realise that researchers are essentially looking at the same problem that has been split up into a million pieces. And each researcher by looking to solving each individual microscopic, nay nanoscopic piece of the bigger problem, claims to be working on a different problem, but in an abstract reality is piecing together or figuring out the same puzzle. Researchers have already started realising this.
Concluding remarks on approach to research
Collaborations are happening left and right these days, I see transportation and logistics courses offered in the IE department at the Texas A and M university. I see many professors who work in different disciplines such as electrical, transportation and computer science engineering also being responsible for creating inter-disciplinary departments. Math is catching up fast with biology - an idea that would have unthinkable a decade back. After all, when you have a tool/software/algorithm/methodology, you would like to test it on as many fields as possible, wouldn't you? Engineering beckons a person with such a tool! So you see, it all comes back to the fundamentals. What are the fundamental principles that govern the behaviour of our world, what processes are common to many of the engineering systems we see in the world today? When you start looking at these questions, the natural way to approach such problems is through systems engineering. Research in the future, I believe should go the systems way - laying emphasis on the fundamentals and consequently on maths, science and its applications, not starting with an application and somehow looking to bring in math and science in an awkward manner. But the problem here is transportation by itself is a very interesting field with all the policy, implementation and political issues and to ask a person to be conversant with all of these issues and methodological tools and techniques is asking a little too much. Therefore, a better solution would be to take the middle path and integrate as many existing related departments and disciplines at some level that help spur collaborations and promote inter-disciplinary research. The good thing is researchers are flexible to ideas. When the idea is good, it is bound to be implemented, provided the idea is communicated to a wide spectrum of the research community. It's kind of an evolution - An evolution in the way research is done.
Introduction
When I heard from a friend that the civil engineering department at the University of California Davis encourages its students to take courses from other departments such as Applied Math department, it made a lot of sense to me. Transportation Engineering, a sub-division of Civil Engineering is an application oriented field. But what tools are you going to use for approaching transportation problems? Say I need to design, route and schedule a rail transit network in Seattle, my main goals for such a problem/project would be to capture as much segment of the population as possible, all the while minimizing travel, operation and maintenance costs. It is easy to see that this problem can formulated as an optimization problem where you optimize(minimize or maximize) certain objectives: Say minimize travel costs or cost of design and build or maximize the number of people served. You can also have a multiple objectives that are minimized or maximized simultaneously - Talk about multi-objective optimization and you are talking about a HOT field in Operations Research. You see how Math and Transportation are intricately linked now? How do you expect Transportation Engineers to make effective decisions if the tools(software, analysis tools, etc) they use are not catching up with the developments in Applied Math for instance.
The right approach?
You don't have to look at what's going on in terms of research at the Math department, you wouldn't understand it anyway, not to say anything about applying it to engineering. But how about applied math research, these guys have a solid Math background and they are looking to use this background to solve problems in Engineering.
Now when they start doing that, engineers need to stop doing whatever they are doing and seriously consider how their contribution to research might be enhanced by collaborating with the Applied Math guys. Engineers especially in an application oriented field like Transportation are at an advantage in terms of data, since considerable amount of time is spent in data collection efforts through stated preference surveys, house-hold interviews, etc. Transporataiton engineers also spend a considerable time formulating a problem since a real-world problem isn't that easy to formulate into a known model that can be analysed. On the other hand people in the Math Department need a problem. They start with a problem and analyse it to no end or let's say till they reach the end...the end of the proof to a theorem!
It is a kind of startling realisation that researchers in Math and Engineering streams are looking at the same puzzle at the macroscopic level, but since research is always at the microscopic level, the microcsomic worlds of Mathematicians and Engineers seem different.
The need for collaboration
So we have the problem features, problem formulation and data collection on one side and you have analytical tools, methodologies an problem solving on the other side. But everything here has to do with one word - Problem . That's what's troubling everyone. There seems to be a problem or is there? - the engineers crib. Ha, this problem you have given me is interesting and challenging, is the mathematicans exclamaton.
Piecing together what the Engineers and Mathematicians talk about, it can be seen that collaboration would make more sense since one can combine the methodology and tools from the App Math dept with the experience in data collection and problem formulation from the Engineering side and the results would be: a) Practical since the data being analysed is from the real world b) Have a sound methodological backing c) Pave the path for continuous innovation due to the very nature of such a collaboration.
This kind of thinking, though abstract, in the end, if I may be a tad more idealistic, would lead one to realise that researchers are essentially looking at the same problem that has been split up into a million pieces. And each researcher by looking to solving each individual microscopic, nay nanoscopic piece of the bigger problem, claims to be working on a different problem, but in an abstract reality is piecing together or figuring out the same puzzle. Researchers have already started realising this.
Concluding remarks on approach to research
Collaborations are happening left and right these days, I see transportation and logistics courses offered in the IE department at the Texas A and M university. I see many professors who work in different disciplines such as electrical, transportation and computer science engineering also being responsible for creating inter-disciplinary departments. Math is catching up fast with biology - an idea that would have unthinkable a decade back. After all, when you have a tool/software/algorithm/methodology, you would like to test it on as many fields as possible, wouldn't you? Engineering beckons a person with such a tool! So you see, it all comes back to the fundamentals. What are the fundamental principles that govern the behaviour of our world, what processes are common to many of the engineering systems we see in the world today? When you start looking at these questions, the natural way to approach such problems is through systems engineering. Research in the future, I believe should go the systems way - laying emphasis on the fundamentals and consequently on maths, science and its applications, not starting with an application and somehow looking to bring in math and science in an awkward manner. But the problem here is transportation by itself is a very interesting field with all the policy, implementation and political issues and to ask a person to be conversant with all of these issues and methodological tools and techniques is asking a little too much. Therefore, a better solution would be to take the middle path and integrate as many existing related departments and disciplines at some level that help spur collaborations and promote inter-disciplinary research. The good thing is researchers are flexible to ideas. When the idea is good, it is bound to be implemented, provided the idea is communicated to a wide spectrum of the research community. It's kind of an evolution - An evolution in the way research is done.
Monday, April 2, 2007
Principles
HHH WFE CLMS DX(C)
Mnemonic: HHH (Triple H) in the World Wrestling Federeation claims to be a part of D - Generation X or DX.
HH - Hard work (doubly emphasised)
H - Humility
W - Will Power
F - Focus
E - Equanimity
C - Clarity in thought
L - Lack of lethargy
M - Meditation
S - Silence
D - Discipline (With special focus on the daily routine and sleep times)
X(C) - Extreme Confidence
Mnemonic: HHH (Triple H) in the World Wrestling Federeation claims to be a part of D - Generation X or DX.
HH - Hard work (doubly emphasised)
H - Humility
W - Will Power
F - Focus
E - Equanimity
C - Clarity in thought
L - Lack of lethargy
M - Meditation
S - Silence
D - Discipline (With special focus on the daily routine and sleep times)
X(C) - Extreme Confidence
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Dreamer
I dream a lot. I dream of doing great things. I dream of living life to the fullest. I dream of taking risks without any hesitation if I think its worth my while. I dream of doing some top notch research which involves a lot of math. At the same time, I dream of ramping up my running and biking.. Doing marathons and long-distance cycling. I dream of being in a state where I can do all of these things and even more...that state of mind where you are very clear of what's to be done next..nay, what's do be done now, at this very moment. I dream of being a god in my area of research. I dream...I dream..and I dream.
My dreams will just be dreams as long as I only dream and not act. I realise the great potential in these dreams, but at the same time I realise the importance of being down-to-earth, on the importance of knowing where I stand right now as against where I dream myself to be. Consistency in work is more important than random spurts of good work. That's what a phd is all about...Consistent work in an area that interests' you.
And finally, I dream of being consistent in my work.
My dreams will just be dreams as long as I only dream and not act. I realise the great potential in these dreams, but at the same time I realise the importance of being down-to-earth, on the importance of knowing where I stand right now as against where I dream myself to be. Consistency in work is more important than random spurts of good work. That's what a phd is all about...Consistent work in an area that interests' you.
And finally, I dream of being consistent in my work.
Saturday, March 17, 2007
VRP
A good site on the web that summarizes the problem features, formulations and solution techniques to the VRP(Vehicle routing problem) and its variants such as VRPTW(with time windows), SVRP(stochastic), VRPPD (both pick-up and delivery), CVRP (capacitated), PVRP (periodic), SDVRP (Split delivery),MDVRP(Multiple depot), etc...
Also a nice bibliography of the algorithms and solution techniques for VRP and its variants can be found here.
Also a nice bibliography of the algorithms and solution techniques for VRP and its variants can be found here.
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Writing a research proposal
I took this seminar course whose aim is basically to give you a set of tools to guide your research and fine tune the way you conduct research. Three take homes I got from this seminar are:
1) When to reference and when not to reference when you write a paper
2) Giving a presentation: What needs to be taken care of, the good and bad of a few case presentations.
3) Research proposal: Writing one effectively.
I will just discuss the third take home. Here's a good article on writing a research proposal. Find a pdf version here.
To summarize the article:
There are two things to writing a research proposal - a) The writing part of it b) The content and structure part of it.
The writing part is similar to writing any document - The document should be coherent, have a flow, should be concise and also be easily understandable to the targetted audience.
The content can be summarized as follows and is very similar to the structure of a thesis:
a) Abstract - What is it that you propose to do in your research summarized briefly in a paragraph.
b) Introduction - i) Should clearly define the objectives of the study or research to be conducted
ii) Should establish the context of the study and its significance and/or contribution practically(application) and theoretically(model/technique development/formulation of the problem, etc).
iii) The main problem features should be described and the scope of the problem clearly delineated.
c) Literature review - Should include all contributions from literature relevant to the problem area. The contributions should not be rambling but should be expressed concisely though effectively.
d) Solution Methodology - Should be described in the context of what is in the literature. Should narrow down a few solution techniques and the pros and cons of this subset of techniques should be briefly described.
e) Data - What data do you think is required for this problem. How are you going to get it(Experiments/data collection, etc).
f) Discussion - Summarize the research briefly. Discuss the pros and cons of the solution methodology adopted, data to be used, etc.
Usually a research proposal is made to obtain grants and funding for the research. So a research proposal should be written in a manner that highlights the significance of the research and its contribution. Hence the emphasis on both the 'writing' and the 'content'.
1) When to reference and when not to reference when you write a paper
2) Giving a presentation: What needs to be taken care of, the good and bad of a few case presentations.
3) Research proposal: Writing one effectively.
I will just discuss the third take home. Here's a good article on writing a research proposal. Find a pdf version here.
To summarize the article:
There are two things to writing a research proposal - a) The writing part of it b) The content and structure part of it.
The writing part is similar to writing any document - The document should be coherent, have a flow, should be concise and also be easily understandable to the targetted audience.
The content can be summarized as follows and is very similar to the structure of a thesis:
a) Abstract - What is it that you propose to do in your research summarized briefly in a paragraph.
b) Introduction - i) Should clearly define the objectives of the study or research to be conducted
ii) Should establish the context of the study and its significance and/or contribution practically(application) and theoretically(model/technique development/formulation of the problem, etc).
iii) The main problem features should be described and the scope of the problem clearly delineated.
c) Literature review - Should include all contributions from literature relevant to the problem area. The contributions should not be rambling but should be expressed concisely though effectively.
d) Solution Methodology - Should be described in the context of what is in the literature. Should narrow down a few solution techniques and the pros and cons of this subset of techniques should be briefly described.
e) Data - What data do you think is required for this problem. How are you going to get it(Experiments/data collection, etc).
f) Discussion - Summarize the research briefly. Discuss the pros and cons of the solution methodology adopted, data to be used, etc.
Usually a research proposal is made to obtain grants and funding for the research. So a research proposal should be written in a manner that highlights the significance of the research and its contribution. Hence the emphasis on both the 'writing' and the 'content'.
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
A case of mistaken identity
I was standing in line at the subway inside the hub(univ food joint and hangout..something like a gurunath+sac+clt in iitm put together in one building) during lunch time. There were around 8-9 people ahead of me and no one behind me. The queue moves ahead and then this guy, who I recognize to be an indian, comes along walking really fast with his head slightly tilted downward and to the left, and joins the queue behind me. A few minutes pass and I wonder where he is from.
Me: "Which department are you from?"
Him: 'Computer science department'
Me: "So are you a Phd student?"
Him: 'No I am teaching'
I bulb for a moment and then.....
Me: "So you... you are an assistant professor?"
Him: 'Yeah'
I am, needless to say, a little embarassed; but what can one do when the professor looks, walks, talks like a grad student. After some more small talk, I go my way.
Me: "Which department are you from?"
Him: 'Computer science department'
Me: "So are you a Phd student?"
Him: 'No I am teaching'
I bulb for a moment and then.....
Me: "So you... you are an assistant professor?"
Him: 'Yeah'
I am, needless to say, a little embarassed; but what can one do when the professor looks, walks, talks like a grad student. After some more small talk, I go my way.
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