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HCIL members publish 19 papers, win multiple awards at CHI 2023

The 2023 ACM conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) features contributions from a large number of HCIL members. Congratulations to the 15 HCIL faculty and 17 students who had papers, workshops, and SIGs (special interest groups) accepted at this year’s conference. We extend a special congratulations to the three papers that received honorable…

Catherine Plaisant, Jesse Grosjean and Ben Bederson recognized with IEEE VIS “Test of Time Award” for their 2002 work on zoomable tree browsers

On October 18, 2022 Catherine Plaisant, Jesse Grosjean and Ben Bederson will receive the IEEE Infovis Test of Time Award from their 2002 work on zoomable tree browsers, which was published in the InfoVis 2002 conference. IEEE VIS is the premier conference on information visualization, scientific visualization, and visual analytics.The Test of Time Award recognizes papers…

HCIL Faculty and Student Participation at CHI 2022

CHI 2022 marks a return to an in-person format for the biggest HCI research conference, and the HCIL will be well represented at this year’s event, which will be held April 30-May 5, 2022 in New Orleans, LA, USA. Now that the program has been released, we are proud to announce that nine papers, two…

Ben Shneiderman and Ben Bederson recognized with IEEE VIS “Test of Time Award” for their 2001 work on Ordered Treemap Layouts

On October 26 Ben Shneiderman, Ben Bederson and Martin Wattenberg will receive the IEEE VIS Test of Time Award from their 2001 work on treemaps, which was published in the InfoVis conference. The greatly expanded IEEE VIS conference has unified the the conferences on information visualization, scientific visualization, and visual analytics.This award is an important recognition…

Niklas Elmqvist passes the baton to Jessica Vitak, new director of HCIL

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Jessica Vitak Appointed New Director of HCIL

Jessica Vitak, associate professor in the University of Maryland’s iSchool and affiliate professor in UMD’s Communication Department began her term as the new director of HCIL on August 30, 2021. Jessica has been part of the HCIL since joining the iSchool in 2012. Her research explores the privacy, surveillance, and ethical challenges raised by new technologies. In…

Catherine Plaisant retires after 34 years at HCIL

Catherine Plaisant, Associate Director of Research of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab and a senior research scientist in the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS), retired on June 4th 2021. UMIACS published a story: Catherine Plaisant Concludes Stellar 34-Year Career at UMD and produce this video:

Jonathan Lazar elected to the ACM SIGCHI Academy

Jonathan Lazar was elected to the ACM SIGCHI Academy, SIGCHI’s recognition of influential scholars in the field of HCI. The award ceremony took place on May 6th, 2021 prior to the CHI 2021 Virtual Conference. Congratulations Jonathan on this major award!

Catherine Plaisant Honored with IEEE VGTC Visualization Career Award

Catherine Plaisant, Associate Director of Research of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab and a senior research scientist in the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS), has been recognized by IEEE VGTC with the Visualization Career Award. The award was presented on October 27th, 2020 at the VIS 2020 conference, during the virtual opening…

Niklas Elmqvist co-PI on a $3M NSF Convergence Accelerator grant to develop new workforce training using augmented and virtual reality  

Niklas Elmqvist is co-PI on a $3M NSF Convergence Accelerator grant led by Karthik Ramani (the Donald W. Feddersen Distinguished Professor in Mechanical Engineering at Purdue University). This project aims to develop new workforce training using augmented and virtual reality.  This project, SkillXR, will focus on the manufacturing industry, which traditionally has had low-tech employee training methods (in-person…