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Esin Saka Knowledge Discovery and Intelligent Web Applications
Lab Department of Computer Science and Computer
Engineering University of Louisville Louisville, KY, 40292 phone: 502-852-4202, email: esin dot saka at
louisville dot edu |
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OBJECTIVE
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A researcher position in a research-intensive
environment to contribute to the discovery and development of new ideas and
new technologies in classification, clustering, data visualization, semantic
web, information retrieval, machine learning, real time intelligent
recommender systems, and personalization with opportunities to
support others, especially women, in computer science and engineering field. |
SUMMARY OF SKILLS
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· Hands-on experience in software development and programming. · Knowledge of web mining, algorithms, artificial intelligence, machine learning, genetic programming, multi-agent systems, natural language processing. · Ability to work well both independently and in team
environment as a leader or a member. · Goal oriented and hard working individual determined to
succeed. |
EDUCATION
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· University of Louisville, Louisville, KY, USA PhD in Computer Engineering and Computer Science, working with Prof. Olfa Nasraoui |
Expected in 2010 GPA 4.0/4.0 |
· Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey
M.S in Computer Engineering B.S in Computer Engineering B.S in Mathematics (Double Major) |
June 2005 June 2002 June 2002 |
EXPERIENCE
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· Microsoft Research |
July 2008 – October 2008 |
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Research Intern Solved an existing
problem related to the Live Search (http://www.bing.com/)
logs and delivered an automated solution with Web mining algorithms, using C#
and T-SQL. |
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· Yahoo!
Inc. |
May 2007 – August 2007 |
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Engineering Intern Improved the Yahoo!
Sponsored Search, Editorial and Advertiser Systems with data mining methods,
using Java, XML, scripting, Eclipse and database applications. |
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· University
of Louisville Department of Computer Engineering and Computer Science |
August 2005 – present |
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Knowledge Discovery and
Web Applications Lab Research Assistant § Proposed a new dynamic
clustering and dynamic data
visualization algorithm using swarm intelligence, implemented using C and
Gnuplot, tested on several datasets using bash scripting. § Proposed and implemented a simultaneous clustering and data visualization algorithm using
swarm intelligence with C and Gnuplot, applied on high dimensional sparse
dataset, decreased the computational complexity from O(n2) to O(n). § Proposed a search engine based recommender system,
implemented using Nutch, Tomcat, Squid (Team work). § Extracted user profiles on Web server logs using
genetic programming with Java (Team work). § Implemented and run experiments on validation and
evaluation of user clusters/profiles with C and bash scripting. § Submitted class projects on: o Multi-agent client-side personalization for the Web,
using C o Experimental design
analysis for the effects of factors and their interactions on the quality of
user profiles o Spam e-mail detection (classification) with regression,
decision trees and neural networks using SAS and Weka o Clustering noisy data with K-means, DBScan and MakeDensityBased- Clusterer using Matlab
and Weka o Robot behaviors, including reinforcement learning,
using LEGO Robotic Invention System 2.0 kits and Handy Board Microcontroller
Units with IC o Grid computing (Alchemi) and MPI programming. Teaching Assistant § CECS 121 Program Design in C |
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· Middle
East Technical University Department of Computer Engineering |
December 2002-August 2005 |
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Assistant § Masters thesis on tree encodings for evolutionary
computing. § Graduation project on Multi-Agent A* Search on maze
domain. § Class projects on o
Reinforcement
Learning (Q-Learning). o
Neural Networks
such as Self-Organizing Maps, Feed-Forward Shunting Network, Back Propagation
for Multi-Layer Perceptron. o
Natural language
processing (part-of-speech tagging for Turkish). o
Windows remote
command line service using C++. § Studies on design, solution, evaluation and
complexity analysis of algorithmic problems. § Teaching experience as a teaching assistant for: o
CEng111 Scheme
programming and Introduction to Computer Engineering o
CEng140 C
Programming o
CEng561
Artificial Intelligence o
CEng334
Operating Systems |
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· The
Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK) Turkish National
Academic Network and Information Center (ULAKBİM), Researcher Implementation of a
book sales system using HTML, PHP, Perl. |
August 2002-December 2002 |
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· TÜBİTAK
National Informatics Olympiad, Technical Committee Member |
December 2002-2004 |
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Design, solution and
evaluation of algorithmic problems in the scope of International Olympiad in
Informatics. |
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· TÜBİTAK
National Informatics Olympiad Summer and Winter Camps Assistant |
Summer 1999-2004 January 2000-2005 |
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Teaching C and
algorithms; design, solution and evaluation of algorithmic problems in the
scope of International Olympiad in Informatics. |
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· Summer
Internship in TÜBİTAK-BAYG Solution and
computational complexity analysis of algorithmic problems. |
Summer 2001 |
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· Summer
Internship in METU Informatics Institute |
Summer 2000 |
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Implementation
of a test tool using Rational Rose, Java, Java Applet, Java Servlet, HTML,
JDBC, PostgreSQL. |
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HONORS
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· Recognized in Who’s Who Among Students in American
Universities and Colleges |
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2010 |
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· NSF travel fellowship to attend ICDE 2010 |
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March 2010 |
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· Best
graduate poster at the Kentucky Women in Computing Conference |
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February 2010 |
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· Google WSDM and WAW
Conference Grant and Travel Award |
2 recipients worldwide |
February 2009 |
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· Quoted on Microsoft Research
Webpage http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/jobs/default.aspx
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February 2009 |
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· IEEE Outstanding CECS Student Award, University of
Louisville |
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April 2008 |
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· Yahoo! Sponsored Search Contest |
1st
Team Degree |
August 2007 |
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Immortalized in the
Panamaniac Hall of Fame |
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· Selected for Turkey
Team Deputy Leader at X.
Balkan Olympiad in Informatics |
Represented
the country |
June 2002 |
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· METU Department of Computer Engineering |
First Rank in Fall Semester |
1999 |
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· TÜBİTAK National Mathematics Olympiad |
Regional Degree |
1996 |
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· Trabzon Swimming Contest Among High School Students |
1st
Team Degree |
1996 |
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· TÜBİTAK National Chemistry Project Competition
Degree |
Finalist and Mansion |
1995 |
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· Milliyet Knowledge and Culture Competition |
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1994 |
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· National Poetry Competition About GAP |
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1994 |
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· Milliyet Knowledge and Culture Competition |
1st
Degree in State |
1990 |
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· Grants/Scholarships for |
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Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing |
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2008 |
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Reasoning Web |
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2008 |
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Compulog/ALP Summer School on
Logic Programming |
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2008 |
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CRA-W Grad Cohort |
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2006-2008 |
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Google Workshop for Women Engineers |
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2006 |
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PUBLICATIONS
Book Chapters:
· Olfa Nasraoui, Esin Saka, "Web
Usage Mining in Noisy and Ambiguous Environments: Exploring the Role of Concept
Hierarchies, Compression, and Robust User Profiles", In Berendt, B.,
Hotho, A., & Semeraro, G. (Eds.). WebMine 2006,
Journal Papers:
· Featured article of February 2008 issue: O. Nasraoui, M. Soliman,
Conference Papers:
· E. Saka, O. Nasraoui, “On Dynamic
Data Clustering and Visualization using Swarm Intelligence", ICDE PhD Workshop,
2010.
· Esin Saka, Olfa. Nasraoui, “Dynamic
Clustering and Visualization using Swarm Intelligence", GHC’09 PhD Forum, 2009.
· Esin Saka, Olfa Nasraoui, “Simultaneous
Clustering and Visualization of Web Usage Data using Swarm-based Intelligence",
Proceedings of the 20th IEEE
International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence (ICTAI'08), 2008.
· C. Rojas, O. Nasraoui,
· O. Nasraoui , Z. Zhang, and
Thesis:
· Esin SAKA, “A
Comparative Study of Tree Encodings for Evolutionary Computing", M.Sc.
thesis, METU, 2005.
Posters:
· Esin Saka, “Flock-based Clustering and Data Visualization
of Web Clickstreams",
presented at Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing (GHC) 2008, Keystone
Resort, Colorado, October 1-4, 2008, Kentucky Women in Computing Conference,
February 26-27, 2010.
· Esin Saka, “The Wind
of Flocks for Clustering and Data Visualization ", presented at
Engineering Exposition (E-Expo) 2008,
· Esin Saka, “Intelligent
Web Recommender Systems (with a Fast Open Source Implementation) ", presented
at CRA-W Grad Cohort for Women Program, San Francisco, March 2-3, 2007.
RELATED COURSE WORK
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Ph.D.: · Web Mining for E-Commerce · Data Mining · Advanced Techniques for Internet
Search and Navigation · Combinatorial Optimization · Multi-agent Learning · Design and Analysis of
Computer Algorithms · Fundamentals of Autonomous Robots · Experimental Design · Computer Architecture Masters: · Distributed Artificial
Intelligence · Neurocomputing · Statistical Learning and Simulation · Computational Linguistics · Logic and Databases · Introduction to Theory of
Computation · Computer Networks and Communications Undergraduate: CENG: · Artificial Intelligence · Introduction to Natural
Language Processing · Algorithms · Lisp and Prolog · Programming Languages · Data Structures · Software Engineering · Compiler · Fundamentals of Image
Processing · Computer Graphics Double
Major : Math: · Probability Theory · Mathematical Aspects of Cryptography · Graph Theory · Calculus · Complex Calculus · Honors’ Linear Algebra · Mathematical Analysis · Abstract Algebra · Differential Geometry · Elementary Number Theory |
CONFERENCES & WORKSHOPS
·
2009-2010 Graduate
Teaching Academy at the University of Louisville, Fall 2009 and Spring 2010.
·
The International
Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining (KDD’09), Paris, France, June
28th- July 1st, 2009.
·
T he CRA-W
Grad Cohort for Women Program, Seattle, March 13-14, 2008, Student Speaker.
·
SAS
Day at University of Louisville, September
21, 2007.
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SoutheastCon, Richmond, VA, March 22-25, 2007.
·
The CRA-W Grad
Cohort for Women Program, San Francisco, March 2-3, 2007.
·
IEEE World Congress on Computational Intelligence,
Vancouver, BC, Canada, July 16-21, 2006.
·
The CRA-W Grad
Cohort for Women Program, San Francisco, March 31-April 1, 2006.
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Selected for Google
Workshop for Women Engineers, Mountain View, CA, January 20-22, 2006.
CURRENT AND PREVIOUS RESPONSIBILITIES
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· “Advances in Mining the Web” tutorial
in KDD’09, Assistant for preparing and presenting the tutorial |
2009 |
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· Research Program for CECS Undergraduate Students,
University of Louisville, Mentor |
2009 |
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· INSPIRE (Program for minorities -&females-
and non-minorities to increase interest for engineering), Student
Speaker |
2008 |
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· The CRA-W Grad Cohort for Women Program, 2008,
Student Speaker |
2008 |
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· The 2008 Mayor’s Healthy Hometown Hike & Bike, Louisville
KY, Volunteer |
2008 |
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· Univ. of Louisville International Banquet Performer,
Ballroom Dancing and Turkish Folk
Dancing |
2008 |
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· Girls Career day, University of Louisville, 2006,
2008,2010 Speaker |
2006, 2008, 2010 |
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· KDD (International Conference on Knowledge Discovery
and Data Mining) 2007, 2008 Reviewer |
2007, 2008 |
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· Middle
East Technical University Alumni Association Mentoring Program, |
2006 – present |
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· ICDM (International Conference on Data Mining) 2006
Reviewer |
2006 |
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· Univ. of Louisville International Banquet Performer,
Turkish Poem and Slide Show |
2006 |
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· X. Balkan Olympiad in |
June 2002 |
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· METU Computer
Club (CCLUB) Chair |
September 2001- September 2002 |
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· METU CCLUB Olympiads Scientific Workgroup Chair |
2002 – 2005 |
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· SAT, Underwater Science and Technology Meeting
(SBT2000), Organization |
December 2000 |
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· International Olympiad In Informatics 1999, Guide |
October 1999 |
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ASSOCIATIONS
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· University of Louisville, CECS Graduate Students
Group |
Founding Member |
2009 – present |
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· Executive Committee of the Louisville Section of the
IEEE |
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2006 – 2009 |
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· U of L Dance with the Cards |
Council Member (2007 – 2009) |
2006 – present |
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· U of L Graduate Student Council |
Information Committee Chair
(2006 – 2007) |
2005 – 2007 |
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· METU Computer Club (CCLUB) |
Chair (September 2001-
September 2002) |
1999 – present |
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· METU Subaqua Society (SAT) |
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2001 – present |
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· METU-SAT Cave Diving and Research Group (MADAG) |
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2001 – present |
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· IEEE Student Member |
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1999 – present |
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· IEEE-METU Computer Branch |
Founding Member |
1999 – 2002 |
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· METU Theatre Society |
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1999 – 2000 |
LANGUAGES
·
English - Upper
level
·
German - Beginner
Level
·
Turkish - Native
Language
HOBBIES
Surfing, Snowboarding, Couple
Dances, SCUBA Diving, Modern Dance, Playing piano, Wind Surfing, Swimming,
Tennis, Basketball, Tae kwon do, and Traveling.
REFERENCES
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Dr.
Olfa Nasraoui (E-Commerce Endowed Chair) |
olfa.nasraoui@louisville.edu |
1 (502) 852
0191 |