Philadelphia Marathon

Posted on November 26, 2012 by admin

It never ceases to amaze me how deeply personally satisfactory it feels to do something you thought you could never do. Having had knee troubles for many years (me and my knee troubles go back years, all the way back to when I fractured my kneecap in a cycling accident), even as I was running 1/2 marathons and triathlons, I was sure that full marathons were not for me. Too much pounding. Too much pain. No, definitely not for me.

And — I did it! Did it did it did it! Philadelphia marathon 2012, 4:04. Beautiful day and a wonderfully organized race. Philly has a special place in my heart as the first US city I visited, so running my first marathon here was really fitting. And I ran my very first marathon in the T-shirt I got at my first ever running race, the 2008 Newport 10K. And my knee was absolutely fine, too (although getting it to be fine with this distance took years of work).

Past the race: I’m a marathoner!

DSC_0418

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Postdocs in Canada: Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships

Posted on September 19, 2012 by admin

I have not been keeping up with Canadian NSERC grant options, and only now discovered Banting Postdoctoral Fellowships, that offer attractive postdoctoral salaries to both Canadian and international researchers. Fantastic opportunities for foreigners that want to build a scientific career in Canada; I really hope these are well-advertised in non-Canadian institution.

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Startup Jobs: Misconceptions

Posted on July 21, 2012 by admin

Excellent article on misconceptions about startup jobs for technical people — http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-your-time-in-crappy-startup-jobs/

Many points are dead on, yet somehow very rarely get stated. A tidbit that resonates with me: startups are often perceived as places where engineers will be changing the world. Yet, as the article correctly points out, “with some exceptions, startups are generally not vehicles for world-changing visions. Startups need to think about earning revenue within the existing world, not changing humanity as we know it. Most of them are application-level concepts that fill out an existing world-changing trend (like the Internet) but not primary drivers. “

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Escape from Alcatraz 2012

Posted on June 26, 2012 by admin

Long before I even started exercising, I caught, randomly, a Canadian TV special dedicated to the Escape From Alcatraz Triathlon race.  It seemed insane — people swim over 2km from the Alcatraz Island to the San Fransisco shore, then bike on San Fransisco hills, and then also run 8 miles, also on these crazy hills! Insane! What kind of a crazy person would want to do this, I thought.

Fast forward 5 years, and — last week, I did it. Forced myself to jump off the San Fransisco Belle into the very cold water with the coast barely even visible, battled currents for far too long and then biked the hills and ran the beautiful but treacherous 8 miles on all sorts of terrain including the soft pacific sand.  Fantastic experience.

Finishing up the race with the biggest smile on my face:

Alcatraz_run_Gorlatova

Continue reading →

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2011 IEEE Communications Society Award

Posted on December 25, 2011 by admin

MariaGorlatova_Globecom_awardI received the 2011 IEEE Communications Society Award for Advances in Communications earlier this month at the 2011 IEEE GLOBECOM award ceremony in Houston, TX.  This award recognizes papers that open new lines of work, envision bold approaches to communication, formulate new problems to solve, and essentially enlarge the field of communications engineering.

More information about the paper and the awards, via Columbia University School of Engineering: EE/CS Paper Wins National Award for New Communication Topics.

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EnHANTs Project Demo Video

Posted on December 6, 2011 by admin

We have put together a video of the EnHANTs testbed demonstration, based on the demonstration we presented — and got the Best Student Demo Award for — at ACM SenSys 2011 back in November. The video is available here.

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Bright Future for Wearable Smart Devices?

Posted on September 5, 2011 by admin

This week’s Economist has a piece on Marc Andreessen, a founder of Mosaic and Netscape turned venture capitalist. One of the things he apparently believes is that there soon be drastic changes in realm of personal technology and “body area networks” with wearable smart devices.

[Full article (but this is just an offhand remark in it) is available here ]

For a sensor networking person, it is truly exciting to see a prominent VC share this vision of the future. Furthermore, it is also very encouraging to see how successful Nike+ has been with their model of combining personal wearable sensors and social networking. Energy — battery size and lifetime — are still limiting factors for wearable devices, making energy harvesting projects evermore exciting and timely.

Posted in Communication networks, Consumer technology, Energy harvesting, Good reads, Industry, Internet of Things, Technology, Wearable computing | Tagged , | Comments Off on Bright Future for Wearable Smart Devices?

Scientific Process

Posted on August 14, 2011 by admin

Scientific process as we imagine it to be and as it is.

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IoT infographic

Posted on August 5, 2011 by admin

Neat Internet of Things infographic.

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Fascinating Papers: “Is the PHY Layer Dead?”

Posted on June 25, 2011 by admin

For the last few months the IEEE Communications Society top-10 downloaded papers list has included a broad paper based on a conference panel discussion: “Is the PHY Layer Dead?” by Mischa Dohler et al. This paper makes for a fascinating read; many of the issues highlighted in it, such as lack of connections between industry and academia, apply as much to the whole communications networking field as to the PHY layer.

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