Information on this page is last updated in August 2006
Olcay Kurşun
Department of Engineering Technology
and
School of Computer Science
at the
University of Central Florida
Ph.D. (2004) Computer Science, U. of Central Florida, Orlando, FL, USA
M.Sc. (2001) Computer Science, U. of Central Florida, Orlando, FL, USA
M.Eng.(2000) Computer Engineering, Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey
B.Sc. (1998) Computer Engineering, Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey
Biography and Publications
Course materials are available here.
Academics:
Currently, I am a post-doctorate fellow in Public Safety and Technology Center
at the University of Central Florida,
in collaboration with Orange County Sheriff's Office for developing
artificial intelligence tools for data analysis in distributed
databases and GIS-based tools that can increase the probability of
offender apprehension. The Public Safety Technology Center is a
problem-solving partnership between Florida's Sheriff's and Police Chiefs,
the University of Central Florida, the Florida Department of Law
Enforcement, and state and local government. I have worked on various
tools including auto-theft&recovery,
partial name matching queries in large databases, anomaly detection
in pawn profiles.
I received my doctorate degree in
Computer Science at the University of Central Florida in 2004. My main
interests include unsupervised learning with particular emphasis on
support vector machines and neural network models, pattern recognition,
factor analysis, Bayesian networks, and artificial intelligence.
One of my primary focus areas is the development of computational
models for discovering hidden variables and high-order regularities in
observed phenomena. I have worked with Oleg
Favorov, who is currently an Associate Professor in Biomedical
Engineering at the Univeristy of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, on
understanding of brain's function and creation of artificial neural
systems with information-processing capabilities comparable to those of
biological systems and also applied my research work in areas such as
functional genomics and computer vision. I have publications on extraction
and use of orderly features in functional genomics (specifically metabonomics)
and natural images.
I have also been appointed as a visiting faculty in the School of
Computer Science at the University of Central Florida, where I have
taught both graduate and undergraduate courses.
Courses I have taught at UCF:
Formal Languages and Automata Theory (Graduate Level)
(Fall 2003)
Introduction to Discrete Mathematics
(Fall2003, Spring2004, Summer2004)
Introduction to C Programming
(Fall2005, Spring2006, Summer2006)
Introduction to Object Oriented Programming (Java Programming)
(Summer2006)
Formal Languages and Automata Theory (Discrete Structures 2)
(Fall2002, Summer2003, Fall2003, Summer2004, Summer2005, Fall 2005,
Spring 2006)
Algorithm Design (Computer Science 3)
(Spring2004)
Things I learned as I teach:
You must have heard the saying "Give a man a fish, you have fed him
for today. Teach a man to fish, and you have fed him for a lifetime".
Nevertheless, my approach to the university education is not all about
teaching fishing, it is also about motivating the students into learning
how to fish by making the classes enthusiastic and challenging. It is
more about making them want to learn. What can you
teach to a student who neither wants to be in your class nor cares
to study outside the classroom?
If you try not to be late for the class, you will be. If you try to be
early, then you will be on time.
Contact Info:
Mail Address: School of Computer Science, University
of Central Florida, Orlando, FL 32816-2362
Office: CSB-255
Phone: 407-823-0169
Fax: 407-823-5419
E-mail: kursun@cs.ucf.edu