Recent News & Accomplishments
Students presented their startups and received guidance from experienced entrepreneurs and industry mentors.
Pitching startup ideas to a panel of experienced entrepreneurs has become a familiar format popularized by television shows like Shark Tank. At the University of Maryland’s Capital One Tech Incubator, six student entrepreneurs took part in a similar high-stakes experience during the Pitch Perfect event, where they presented their business concepts to a panel of seasoned mentors. Organized by the Mokhtarzada Hatchery program and Startup Shell , the event allowed students to refine their business concepts, gain industry insights and connect with professionals and peers in the startup ecosystem... read more
Mihai Pop is among the researchers awarded $150,000 for collaborative work on pressing issues.
Seven faculty members—including two from the University of Maryland College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences (CMNS) and four from the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB)—have been appointed 2025 MPower Professors, the University of Maryland Strategic Partnership: MPowering the State (MPower) announced on Wednesday. All have demonstrated collaboration on strategic research that would be unattainable or difficult to achieve by UMB or UMCP acting independently of one another, and they embrace the mission of MPower: to collectively strengthen and serve the state of Maryland and... read more
Students from 28 high schools in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area competed in the three-hour contest.
The University of Maryland’s Department of Computer Science welcomed high school students across the Washington, D.C., area on Saturday, February 8, 2025, for the 35th Annual High School Programming Contest (HSPC) at the Brendan Iribe Center for Computer Science and Engineering . 120 students from 28 high schools participated in the three-hour programming competition. Each school was permitted to send one team of four students, who worked together to solve algorithmic and programming challenges under a time constraint. Teams were evaluated based on the correctness of their solutions, with... read more
A Q&A with Roger Eastman on the program's vision, opportunities and impact.
The rapid integration of technology into everyday life has brought new possibilities for creative expression and innovation. One area seeing significant advancement is immersive media, which engages viewers with sight, sound and other sensory experiences, encouraging interaction with digital environments. The University of Maryland’s Department of Computer Science offers a program dedicated to this field: Immersive Media Design (IMD). Founded to meet the the growing demand for interdisciplinary expertise, the IMD program provides undergraduates with the tools to explore emerging technologies... read more
Jordan Boyd-Graber among the long list of Terps who have appeared on the iconic show.
If you tuned in to “Jeopardy!” on Sept. 21, 2016, you might have seen a young woman clicking desperately on her buzzer, mostly failing to time them to the exact moment that host Alex Trebek finished reading the clue. That young woman was me. Standing on that Los Angeles stage was the culmination of a lifelong love affair with trivia—racing to beat my older brother when our dad asked who was the artist on the oldies station or huddling with my pub trivia team to identify international flags and preening when I was the only one in the bar who knew that Gay Talese wrote the famous New Yorker... read more
“Today is gonna be a really, really fun day for you,” Assistant Dean for Physician Assistant Education and Associate Professor Cheri Hendrix, DHEd, MSBME, PA-C, DFAAPA, told her class of 58 physician assistant (PA) students. In truth, it would be hard to say just who would have the most fun, the students who sat in anticipation of an exciting new high-tech learning experience, or Hendrix, who waited a very long time for this day to arrive. “I think this is really going to enrich what you know about neurologic disease,” she continued, understating her expectations a bit. For the first time,... read more
Li received the award for his research in accessibility and interactive user interface design.
Jiasheng Li , a Ph.D. student in the University of Maryland’s Department of Computer Science, has been awarded the 2024 HCIL Maryland Way Award for Research Excellence. Li received the award for his contributions to accessible user interface design and his research on multimodal interaction techniques. The award, presented annually by the Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL), is the highest honor the lab gives and includes a cash prize. The Maryland Way Award for Research Excellence is given annually to a researcher whose work significantly contributes to Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)... read more
Terp promotes on-screen representation by making avatars more customizable.
If Cassandra Lewis (B.S. '09, computer science) ever feels the urge to see how she’d look with a mohawk, instead of grabbing the clippers, she just opens her laptop. As head of avatar innovation at Meta, she’s also helping billions of users of Facebook, Instagram and more bring their own style to those cute, cartoony online representations, which the company overhauled in October to allow more customization. “I do think it’s fun to have something that looks familiar and does look like me, but then I get to switch out clothing, change up looks, change up hair,” Lewis says. “I have a passion... read more
UMD alum Abhinav Gupta leads Skild AI in advancing adaptable robotics intelligence.
Softbank is negotiating a $500 million investment in Skild AI , a software company building a financial model at a $4 billion valuation. Skild AI builds general-purpose robotic intelligence using cutting-edge machine learning algorithms to create adaptable robots that function across different environments, from construction sites to factories and homes. Skild AI claims its “Skild Brain” is the first scalable robotics foundation model, capable of adapting across hardware and tasks. The company was co-founded by University of Maryland alum Abhinav Gupta (Ph.D. '09, computer science) and Deepak... read more
From NeurIPS research to Half Ironman and developing Promptly AI, Sankaralingam’s journey highlights exploration and growth in computer science.
For many students, college is a time of exploration, self-discovery and growth—both academically and personally. At the University of Maryland, this transformative experience has guided students like junior computer science major Ananth Sankaralingam (B.S. ’26, computer science) as they navigate their unique paths to success. Balancing academic research, entrepreneurial ventures and personal milestones, Sankaralingam has forged a unique and dynamic journey. From presenting research at NeurIPS in Vancouver to creating PolitiMeme , a project examining technology’s role in social discourse and... read more