News

UG Summer Research Experience at MIT Hong Kong Innovation Node

Sponsored by PolyU’s UG Summer Research Abroad Sponsorship Scheme (USRA), six COMP students participated in a 6-week summer research programme at the MIT Hong Kong Innovation Node from 15 June to 30 July 2021. USRA is a signature student learning scheme, which aims to provide financial support to encourage students to undertake research under the guidance and supervision of academics in overseas pre-eminent universities. The core part of this summer research programme was to first identify a real-world problem related to “Smart City” and proposed solutions. Geng Longling and Liu Yunfei (BSc (Hons) in Computing, Year 2) teamed up with Lam Long-ting (BSc (Hons) in Computing, Year 3) as well as a secondary school student to work on a “Smart Traffic Light System”. Smart traffic lights are one of many smart city initiatives that use advanced technology to improve the management of city services and the quality of life for citizens. The traffic lights are based on a dynamic algorithm that can control the lights based on the population and vehicles density. “By working with MIT people, I have a chance to exchange ideas with the most intelligent brains in the world. I was inspired by their awesome ideas and I realised that I need to reconsider my previous ways of thinking,” Yunfei said. Cao Qun, Xu Ying (BSc (Hons) in Computing, Year 3) and Muhammad Shoaib (BSc (Hons) in Enterprise Information Systems, Year 4) worked on other three projects and one of them was “The Supermarket Navigation System”. With the indoor navigation algorithm, customers can search the products they would like to purchase and the system will send the optimal path to the customers so that they can locate the products in the supermarket easily and efficiently. “The experience at the MIT Hong Kong Innovation Node was extremely enriching,” Muhammad shared. “I have learned a lot about IoT and Android app development.” By the end of the programme, students had to give presentations at the Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks (HKSTP) in front of a panel of IoT experts who gave valuable comments and professional advice. During this research internship, participants could gain not only technical knowledge but also teamwork and soft skills.

PolyU Library Virtual Reality Contest 2020

We are glad to announce that two of our undergraduate students, Declan Leung Chun-hin, (BSc (Hons) in Enterprise Information Systems, Year 4) and Wu Chun-hung, (BSc (Hons) in Computing, Year 3) have recently won the Champion and First Runner-up with their projects titled “Chernobyl Disaster” and “Green Ark” respectively in the Virtual Reality (VR) Contest organised by the PolyU Library. Declan teamed up with another student from the Department of Health Technology and Informatics (HTI) to create their VR work “Chernobyl Disaster”. It was a storytelling simulation of the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe. Users could immerse themselves in conducting a VR safe test on a nuclear reactor and get the first-person experience in the incident. “Green Ark” was based on PolyU’s Green Deck plan to build a green public park above the Hung Hom Cross-Harbour Tunnel for recreation use. Chun-hung added a VR effect to let people connecting with this green space. “I have been engaged in VR and game development for at least four years. Joining this contest allowed me to re-examine my weaknesses and ability to complete a single game,” Chun-hung shared. To prepare and encourage students to participate in the contest, a series of online workshops and webinars related to VR was held from October 2020 to April 2021 for them to pick up skills that help them develop their own VR application.

Inauguration Ceremony for PolyU Student Ambassadors 2021-22

Under the “PolyU Student Ambassador Scheme”, vibrant students are appointed as Student Ambassadors (SAs) to promote PolyU to secondary students and the general public through outreaching activities such as Info Day, admission talks, etc. This year, we are glad to announce that two energetic and enthusiastic COMP students are being appointed as PolyU SAs and the Inauguration Ceremony was held on 10 September 2021. Prof. Wong Kwok-yin, Vice President (Education) of PolyU delivered the welcome speech and presented the Certificate of Appreciation to SAs of the previous year in recognition of their contributions, followed by the presentation of the official appointment to new SAs by Mr Edward Shen, Registrar of PolyU. Our student, Declan Leung Chun-hin (BSc (Hons) in Enterprise Information Systems, Year 4) was invited to give a delightful sharing on why he joined the scheme and his expectations. Another student, Isabel Madeleine Kemp, (BSc (Hons) in Computing, Year 4) also shared with us how grateful she was being one of the ambassadors. “When I was still a secondary student, I remembered being perplexed and overwhelmed by selecting my major, wondering where my passion lay and what my dreams were. Just by reading information from the Internet, isn’t enough for the younger generation to grasp and understand what the discipline is,” Isabel said. “I want to take my sharing opportunity, to give secondary students my perspective on studying at PolyU and Computing.” The scheme has been running by the Academic Registry consecutively for 20 years since 2001. To provide SAs with a better understanding of the strength of PolyU and the University’s admission arrangements as well as to further improve their communication and leadership skills, a series of training and briefings were offered to them. They will share their first-hand experience with prospective applicants and actively participate in various promotional activities. In return, they can strengthen their sense of belonging towards the University as well as enhance their communication, leadership presentation, and social skills. We sincerely hope that our SAs will be well equipped to perform their ambassadorial duties for the Department, Faculty and the University in the upcoming year.

Dr Jieming Shi received the Best Paper Award at VLDB 2021

We are pleased to announce that Dr Jieming Shi, Assistant Professor of COMP, together with other five researchers from Nanyang Technological University, National University of Singapore and Hamad Bin Khalifa University received the Best Paper Award at the 47th International Conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB) held from 16 – 20 August 2021 with the paper titled “Scaling Attributed Network Embedding to Massive Graphs”. Given a graph where each node is with a set of attributes, attributed network embedding (ANE) maps each node to a compact vector, which can be used in downstream machine learning tasks. Ideally, the vector should capture the node's affinity to each attribute, which considers not only the node's own attributes but also those of its connected nodes in the graph. It is challenging to obtain high-utility embeddings; scaling effective ANE computation to massive graphs pushes the difficulty of the problem to a whole new level. In this paper, Dr Shi and his team presented “PANE”, an effective and scalable ANE approach for massive graphs, which achieves state-of-the-art quality, measured by the accuracy of three prediction tasks. In particular, for a large graph with over 59 million nodes, 0.98 billion edges, and 2000 attributes, “PANE” is the only known viable solution that obtains effective embeddings on a single server, within 12 hours. “PANE” obtains superior performance through three main algorithmic designs. First, it formulates the learning objective based on a novel random walk model. Second, “PANE” includes an efficient solver for the objective, to drastically reduce the training cost. Finally, “PANE” utilizes multi-core CPUs through non-trivial parallelization, which achieves scalability while retaining the high quality of the results. VLDB is a premier annual international forum for data management and database researchers, vendors, practitioners, application developers, and users. The VLDB 2021 conference featured research talks, tutorials, demonstrations, and workshops. It covered issues in data management, database and information systems research.

Information Security Management Workshop on CISA and CISSP

COMP organised a 3-day online summer workshop on the professional examinations of information security management for our Year 3 to Year 4 students and fresh graduates to prepare them for their career in the related field. Information Security Management is critical in today’s IT industry. Many technical applications such as Fintech, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Data Centre require good information security control and practice. International qualifications such as Certified Information System Auditor (CISA) and Certified Information System Security Professional (CISSP) are highly regarded and recognized by employers. Dr Walter Fung, the workshop instructor and Teaching Fellow of COMP, reviewed the nature and scope of the examinations, qualifications and requirements for being fully certified upon gaining relevant work experience. Various industry practitioners and recent graduates who have attained CISSP and CISA were invited to share their experiences and tips. They also explained the technical details, modules and sample questions under different scenarios. Covering major technical topics, simulation and sample exercises, the workshops successfully guided the students to understand what the certified qualifications are, and enabled them to obtain practical knowledge and helped them to have better preparation for the professional examinations, enhancing their technical competencies and overall employability.

Prof. Chen Changwen is elected as Member of Academia Europaea

We are proud to announce that Prof. Chen Changwen, our Chair Professor of Visual Computing, has been elected as a Member of Academia Europaea (Academy of Europe) under the Informatics Section in recognition of his distinguished achievements and outstanding contribution in the field of computer science. Prof. Chen’s research interests include Multimedia Communication, Internet of Video Things (IoVT), GAN/CNN for Image Aesthetics, Immersive Tele-systems, Machine Learning, Mobile Virtual Reality, etc. He served as the Editor-in-Chief for IEEE Transactions on Multimedia from 2014 - 2016 and for IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology from 2006 - 2009. He has also served as Conference Chair for several major IEEE, ACM and SPIE conferences related to multimedia video communications and signal processing. As an expert in visual computing, Prof. Chen’s research has been supported widely by the industry including NSF, DARPA, Air Force, NASA, Whitaker Foundation, Microsoft, Intel, Kodak, Huawei, and Technicolor. With his exceptional research efforts, Prof. Chen has been named an IEEE Fellow and SPIE Fellow. He has also received a series of research and professional achievement awards, including Sigma Xi Excellence in Graduate Research Mentoring Award in 2003, Alexander von Humboldt Research Award in 2009, the University at Buffalo Exceptional Scholar - Sustained Achievement Award in 2012, the State University of New York System Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities in 2016, and the Distinguished ECE Alumni Award from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2019. Formed in 1988, Academia Europaea is the pan-European academy of science, humanities and letters, with a membership of over 4,000 eminent scholars, drawn from all countries of Europe, and all disciplines, nationalities and geographical locations. In July 2021, the Academy announced that 366 international scholars have been invited to accept membership of the Academia Europaea, following a rigorous peer-review process. Congratulations to Prof. Chen on receiving this honour.

COMP MScIT Welcoming Orientation Session 2021

COMP MSc Orientation Session was smoothly concluded on 28 August 2021. More than 130 newly admitted taught postgraduates participated this year. Dr Korris Chung, Associate Professor and Coordinator of MSc Postgraduate Scheme in Computing, warmly welcomed the students with a brief introduction to the latest development of COMP. Dr Chung also provided information on subjects offered and study patterns. Dr Ken Yiu, Associate Professor and MScIT Programme Leader, shared about programme structure and curriculum while Dr Qixin Wang, Associate Professor and MSc Thesis Coordinator, further explained the study plan for the dissertation and project. Other support including departmental facilities and access to learning resources were demonstrated as well. The Q&A session was very engaging in which the students and our faculty members interacted very well. The Orientation serves as an informative platform for the freshmen to get familiar with the MScIT programme and campus life before the commencement of the semester. Once again, welcome to COMP and hope you all enjoy studying with us!

COMP Undergraduate Orientation Session 2021

To prepare new students for adapting to university studies, COMP organised the Orientation Session virtually for all new undergraduates on 24 August 2021, attracting nearly 200 freshmen. Ir Prof. HC Man, Dean of Faculty of Engineering, officiated the Orientation by extending his warm welcome to students and encouraged them to grasp every opportunity to learn during the time at PolyU, while Dr Hong Va Leong, our Associate Professor and Associate Head (Teaching & Learning), began with the Academic Advising System and learning initiatives at COMP. Various lecturers were invited to briefly introduce the subjects they will be teaching for Year 1. The Orientation also covered Work-Integrated Education and internship, and other student supports and services offered by PolyU. The Orientation was concluded with individual group meetings in breakout rooms between the students and their designated Academic Advisors, who will guide them throughout their studies at COMP, providing them with a great chance to get connected before the commencement of the new academic year. We wish all newbies a fruitful and rewarding learning journey.

Call for Nominations: Outstanding Alumni Award of Department of Computing 2022

The year 2022 marks the 85th Anniversary of PolyU. New features are introduced to the Outstanding PolyU Alumni Award (OPAA) including adding awards at department and faculty levels, to recognise our distinguished alumni’s diverse accomplishments and contributions. The Outstanding Alumni Award of PolyU Department aims to give public recognition to outstanding graduates of a PolyU academic department for their professional achievements and significant contributions to the community and their alma mater.   Award Categories and Selection Criteria The OPAA will be conducted at three levels: Department level, Faculty/ School level and University level. The recipients of the Department Award will be nominated to the Faculty Award. All Faculty/ School awardees will be considered for the University Award.   There are four achievement categories, namely “Professional Achievement”, “Entrepreneurial Achievement”, “Scholarly Achievement” and “Community Service Achievement”. Selection is based on the nominee’s accomplishments in his/ her personal achievements in the field, contributions to the community, and support and contributions to PolyU. Special recognition to young alumni awardees in the award category is added. A candidate who is aged under 40 by the end of the award year can be considered under the Outstanding PolyU Young Alumni stream. Eligibility The nominated candidate must be a bona fide graduate who has successfully completed the full-time or part-time programme offered by PolyU (or its forerunners: Hong Kong Government Trade School, Hong Kong Technical College, Hong Kong Polytechnic; and its constituent units: School of Professional Education & Executive Development and Hong Kong Community College) which led to academic award accredited by the respective Institution.   The proposer can be a PolyU graduate, Honorary Graduate, University Fellow, PolyU staff, current PolyU Council and Court member and current Advisory Committee member. There is no limit to the number of nominations to be submitted by each proposer. However, the proposer cannot be the candidate himself/ herself or a direct relative of the candidate.   Nomination and Selection Schedule The Department of Computing (COMP) is now inviting nominations for the Outstanding Alumni Award of Department of Computing 2022. Please download the Nomination Form and return it to comp.marketing@polyu.edu.hk with all required supplementary documents on or before 31 December 2021.   Selection for the Department Award will be conducted by early Jan 2022. Panel of Judges A panel of judges, comprising both internal and external members, will be formed to examine the nominations and assess candidates’ qualifications and performance for the awards.   Enquiries Department of Computing The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Email: comp.marketing@polyu.edu.hk

PolyU Two-day University Experience Programme 2021

On 3 – 4 August, the Faculty of Engineering (FENG) organised the Two-day University Experience (TUE) Programme online under the theme of “From Physics and ICT to Engineering”, aiming at Secondary 4 to 5 students who are taking Science, ICT, or M1/ M2 subjects. FENG arranged a series of thematic online lectures and quizzes on seven fields of engineering during these two days. Dr Henry Chan, our Associate Professor and Associate Head, represented FENG to officiate the opening of TUE and welcomed the attendees. To begin the COMP’s session, Dr Chan introduced some basic computing concepts with an interactive game to arouse students’ interest. Dr Peter Ng, our Teaching Fellow, delivered a mini-lecture on “Game Technologies” directly afterwards. Students were able to grasp the idea of game development and computer vision including Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). To further illustrate the know-how, they were taken on a virtual tour of our VR and Game Lab. Dr Ng also demonstrated a machine learning project “physical toys recognising” and created two online polling questions about maths in game programming and machine learning for students to express their views. It attracted more than 140 participants. After the closing ceremony, Dr Walter Fung and Dr Richard Lui, our Teaching Fellows, met and chit-chat with the students in the breakout room where they could know more about the study life at COMP and our teaching initiatives. TUE Programme provides a valuable opportunity for secondary students to engage with university academics and experience university learning during the summertime.