- University News Archive - 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock /news-archive/tag/blockchain/ 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Fri, 13 Dec 2019 15:05:25 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock grad explores use of blockchain for state鈥檚 agricultural operations /news-archive/2019/12/13/karen-watts-dicicco-graduation/ Fri, 13 Dec 2019 15:05:25 +0000 /news/?p=75899 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock grad explores use of blockchain for state鈥檚 agricultural operations]]> Picking out the best fresh produce can be a difficult task for many shoppers looking for the best food for their families, but a University of Arkansas at Little Rock graduate student is researching ways to make the process much easier for shoppers and local food producers.听 Karen Watts DiCicco of Bryant will graduate Saturday, Dec. 14, with a master鈥檚 degree in information science. As part of her graduate work, she鈥檚 studying how local food producers can use blockchain technology to safely and securely store and share their data. 鈥淚magine going to the store or the farmers market and looking at two apples,鈥 Watts DiCicco said. 鈥淥ne apple has a QR code you can scan with your smartphone to learn when it was picked, if it鈥檚 organic, if any pesticides were used, etc. Will you go with the apple that you can scan and know the origin of the produce or the apple that you know nothing about? Shoppers, especially those who shop local, want to know where their food comes from.鈥 For her master鈥檚 thesis, Watts DiCicco investigated how blockchain applications are used in agriculture. Originally developed for bitcoin, a blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, that are linked using cryptography. Blockchains are resistant to modification and are becoming an increasingly popular way to store, share, and protect data. In the spring, Watts DiCicco will continue her education and research as a doctoral student in computer and information science at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock. In addition to agricultural research, she鈥檒l research strategies to fight disinformation campaigns online using blockchain technology with the Collaboratorium of Social Media and Online Behavioral Studies (COSMOS), where she works as a graduate assistant. The research group is led by Dr. Nitin Agarwal, Maulden-Entergy Endowed Chair and distinguished professor in the Department of Information Science. The two will publish a book chapter in 2020 entitled, “Blockchain Technology-based Solutions to fight Misinformation: A Survey.” Armed with the knowledge of what works and doesn鈥檛 work regarding agricultural-related blockchain programs, Watts DiCicco鈥檚 next step is to create a survey for consumers, farmers, restaurant owners, and farmers markets in the Little Rock area through her work at the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. This will help her determine what information customers want to see when shopping for food and what information local food producers want to track. The project is being created with financial support from Gov. Asa Hutchinson鈥檚 office. 鈥淢y goal is to create a pilot program using blockchain technology with 6 to 10 local food producers,鈥 she said. 鈥淭hey will enter their agricultural information on a blockchain application that I create. Consumers will be able to know where their food comes from, and producers will receive data analytics from their data.鈥 Following her pilot study, Watts DiCicco will do a follow-up survey to see how her app can be improved and how it can be used by other agricultural vendors in the area. She also plans to conduct workshops and webinars that will educate the public on the benefits of using blockchain. 鈥淎 lot of people still think blockchain is only for bitcoin,鈥 she said. 鈥淎 lot of people don鈥檛 realize that Walmart and other large corporations already use blockchain. Using blockchain is about trust and authenticity. Blockchain will be a value for them.鈥 Watts DiCicco first joined 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock in 2009 as a freshman majoring in information science. As the mother of two sons with special needs, she found it difficult to go to school full time, work, and raise her sons. She left school in 2010, got her cosmetology license, and opened Artistik Salon, which catered to children and adults with special needs.
Karen Watts (left) and Michael DiCicco (right)

Karen Watts DiCicco(left) and Michael DiCicco (right)

鈥淚 had people travel from all over the state because they couldn鈥檛 go anywhere else to have their children鈥檚 haircut,鈥 Watts said. 鈥淎 lot of the children have sensory issues, so it could easily be too loud or crowded, so I catered to each child that came in. It was really hard to close in 2017, but I really wanted to finish my degree. It was a really hard decision since I helped a lot of kids.鈥听 After returning to 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock in 2016, Watts DiCicco graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in information science and a graduate certificate in data science in 2018. In January, the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture hired her as the division鈥檚 first digital and IT innovation manager. She explores new and emerging technologies and how they can be implemented with Division of Agriculture applications. While an undergraduate at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock, Watts traveled the country competing in hackathons 鈥 events in which coders compete or collaborate to create usable software within a limited time. In August, she married her 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock hackathon partner, Michael DiCicco. The family lives in Bryant. ]]> 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Downtown announces fall lecture series /news-archive/2019/11/01/ua-little-rock-downtown-announces-fall-lecture-series/ Fri, 01 Nov 2019 13:28:09 +0000 /news/?p=75559 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Downtown announces fall lecture series]]> Faculty members at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock will present their research on a variety of topics this November at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Downtown. The weekly lecture series will feature presentations about Tableau, blockchain basics, the benefits of mindful self-compassion, the effects of screen time on children, and the use of microcomputers in wildlife and water quality research. The schedule includes: Wednesday, Nov. 6, 6-7 p.m., 鈥淚ntroduction to Tableau鈥 with Dr. Vess Johnson, assistant professor of business information systems Tableau is one of the most widely used platforms for data visualization and visual analytics. Dr. Johnson will provide a brief introduction to Tableau and a hands-on demonstration of how it can be used in a corporate environment to create dashboards and perform analytics. Those who have access to Tableau (a free trial is available online) will be able to follow along. Wednesday, Nov. 13, 6-7 p.m., 鈥淗ow Much is Too Much? Evidence-Based Screen Time Guidelines for Children鈥 with Dr. Chris Lloyd, associate professor in the School of Social Work Thursday, Nov. 14, 5:30-7 p.m., 鈥淏lockchain Basics鈥 with Dr. Kyleen Prewett, associate professor of accounting Blockchain鈥檚 digital ledger technology is poised to transform the way businesses record, store, and transmit information and digital assets. According to PwC鈥檚 2018 Global Blockchain Survey, 84 percent of companies are at least dabbling in blockchain. This seminar presents the basics of how blockchain works and explores how companies like Walmart, IBM, American Express, Amazon, and FedEx are using blockchain today. Wednesday, Nov. 20, 6-7 p.m., 鈥淭he Island Project: Using the Raspberry Pi for the Internet of Things鈥 with Dr. Phil William, bioinformatics technology director in the Department of Information Science Two solar/battery-powered Raspberry Pis, microcomputers running Linux OS, will be onsite at the Island next to the Clinton Presidential Library. One will operate as a wildlife camera, while the other will be used for water quality testing in the Arkansas River. The two units will communicate through a local stand-alone WiFi network. All lectures are free and open to the public; however, individuals are encouraged to RSVP by emailing downtown@ualr.edu. For more information, contact Ross Owyoung, 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Downtown director, at 870-501-2700 or rlowyoung@ualr.edu. More information is available online.]]> 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock grad is taking the Information Technology world by storm /news-archive/2018/12/14/karen-watts-grad/ Fri, 14 Dec 2018 14:10:58 +0000 /news/?p=72973 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock grad is taking the Information Technology world by storm]]> As a sophomore information science major at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock in 2010, Karen Watts of Bryant faced a difficult choice.听 Watts is a single mother of two children with special needs, and the youngest, Gabe, now 11, was in and out of the hospital with health issues. 鈥淚 wanted to stay in school, but I couldn鈥檛 do both,” Watts said. “I had to leave after my first year at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock. I got my cosmetology license, so I could work around my boys鈥 appointments and schedules.鈥 Inspired to help other families, Watts opened Artistik Salon, which catered toward children and adults with special needs. The business was even recognized by local broadcast station with a Pay It Forward Award. 鈥淚 had people travel from all over the state because they couldn鈥檛 go anywhere else to have their children鈥檚 hair cut,鈥 Watts said. 鈥淎 lot of the children have sensory issues, so it could easily be too loud or crowded, so I catered to each child that came in. It was really hard to close in 2017, but I really wanted to finish my degree. It was a really hard decision since I helped a lot of kids.鈥 Watts returned to 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock in 2016 and was accepted into the Accelerated BS to MS program, enabling her to earn a bachelor鈥檚 and master鈥檚 degree in five years. In addition, Watts took four graduate classes as a senior. When she graduates from 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock on Dec. 15, she will earn a Bachelor of Science degree in Information Science as well as a Graduate Certificate in Data Science. At 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock, she is a member of Phi Kappa Phi, an ambassador for the College of Engineering and Information Technology, and a research assistant with the Collaboratorium of Social Media and Online Behavioral Studies (COSMOS), a research group led by Dr. Nitin Agarwal, Maulden-Entergy Endowed Chair and distinguished professor in the Department of Information Science. She credits Agarwal, Dr. Elizabeth Pierce, chair of the Department of Information Science, and all the information science professors with helping her succeed. 鈥淒r. Elizabeth Pierce and Dr. Nitin Agarwal are my mentors, but every professor I鈥檝e had in information science has been wonderful and supportive. Dr. Pierce supported me going to different hackathons to gain skills and network. It鈥檚 been great to continue my research with Dr. Agarwal at COSMOS. It鈥檚 a big change from working at a salon.鈥 As part of her burgeoning hackathon career, Watts and her teammate, Michael DiCicco, beat out 28 other teams as the first place winner of CrimsonHacks in April for their multicurrency cryptocoin wallet called 鈥淭weety Wallet.鈥 The prototype app retrieves tweets from Twitter with hashtags that correspond to cryptocurrency. The app then runs a sentiment analysis to determine if current views of the digital currency are positive or negative. This information helps users determine if they should buy, sell, or hang on to their digital currency. In October, she also won the J.B. Hunt Use Case Award at the 糖心Vlog传媒 Blockchain Hackathon along with DiCicco and Brenda Nyangweso. Watts and her team, sudoIntellectual, created an electronic bill of lading system for J.B. Hunt that they named 鈥淭ruck Hunt.鈥 That led the team to travel to J.B. Hunt鈥檚 corporate headquarters in Lowell, Arkansas, where they made a presentation to the company鈥檚 executives. Watts has received a promising job offer from the company, which would allow her to work with emerging technologies. 鈥淚 stay busy, and I don鈥檛 sleep a lot,鈥 Watts said of her hectic schedule. 鈥淚t鈥檚 very important for my kids, Blakely, 12, and Gabe, 11. They are my life. Everything I have done is for them. I always knew I wanted to come back and finish my degree. The time came, and I was able to, and I hit the ground running. I鈥檓 the first woman in my family to get a college degree.鈥 Watts has also interned at the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture Cooperative Extension Service for over a year, where she has completed some innovative information technology projects. She collaborated with her boss, Amy Cole, to develop the Arkansas Extension chatbot platform, VeggieBot, which is likely the first extension chatbot developed in the U.S. A chatbot is a computer program designed to simulate conversation with people. In the case of VeggieBot, the chatbot will answer basic questions about gardening, which will free up time for the employees and provide a self-service channel that can respond at any time. Additionally, Watts created a new internal employee website. She also assisted in developing a new web app, replacing an outdated system, that assists Arkansas rice producers in managing their rice crops for a senior capstone project. She presented this project at the College of Engineering and Information Technology Open House in April and received the Mainstream Technologies Professional Presentation Award. After completing her master鈥檚 degree in December 2019, Watts plans to earn a Ph.D. in computer and information science at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock, where she will research strategies to fight disinformation campaigns online using blockchain technology with COSMOS. 鈥溙切腣log传媒 Little Rock has given me opportunities to be involved in a research group that opened a whole lot of new doors and helped me decide on my master鈥檚 degree,鈥 she said. 鈥淭he hackathons were another opportunity I wouldn鈥檛 have had outside 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock. I don鈥檛 know of any other schools that offer the 4+1 program where I could earn my bachelor鈥檚 and master鈥檚 degrees in five years and work on my graduate certificate during my senior year. The professors here are incredible and full of knowledge.鈥]]> 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students reach hackathon finals /news-archive/2018/10/11/hackathon-finals/ Thu, 11 Oct 2018 13:00:21 +0000 /news/?p=72175 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students reach hackathon finals]]> University of Arkansas at Little Rock student teams took two of the nine final spots at the 糖心Vlog传媒 BlockChain Hackathon at the University of Arkansas held Sept. 28-29. The hackathon featured 21 teams from Arkansas colleges and universities and was sponsored by nine large businesses such as IBM, Tyson, Heifer International, and J.B. Hunt, who provided challenges focused on using BlockChain technology for teams to present during the competition. Each of the nine sponsors chose a team to advance to the finals where they presented their results against the winners of other challenges. 鈥淏lockChain refers to a distributed database platform that allows for the secure processing and management of transactions across a network,鈥 explained Dr. Liz Pierce, chair of 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock鈥檚 Department of Information Science. 鈥淚t is the technology behind BitCoin and is also of great interest to companies like J.B. Hunt and Walmart who want to be able to track transactions across many different producers and suppliers.鈥 Two 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock teams, representing J.B. Hunt and ArcBest, each won in their challenges and presented their developments in the finals. All of 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock鈥檚 competitors were undergraduates with little to no prior BlockChain experience or knowledge, while most of their competition came from graduate students from the University of Arkansas鈥 BlockChain Center of Excellence. Students Karen Watts, Michael DiCicco, and Brenda Nyangweso won J.B. Hunt鈥檚 challenge and went on to represent them in the finals, along with Aaron David, Brock Butler, Hunter Wright, Ian Thompson, and Sunny Singh from the ArcBest team. An additional 25 more 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students also took part in the competition: Thomas Emmerling, Naveed Siddiqui, Brenda Chepkorir, Yinqi Chen, Ryan Moore, Peter Israsena, Hengchang Liao, Nicholas Stewart, Zhenlin Jin, Kyle Hooks, Zachary Long, Bushra Sajid, Saba Khalid, Christopher Lewis, Brady Moore, Moteet Bakeman, Mughal Minhaj Uddin, Lucas Rayburn, Hitaxiben Patel, Donovan Valestin, Shibani Lal, Richard Young, Malik El-Amin, Christian Aqui, and Kristen Stewart. Butler, a junior information science major from Hot Springs, and his team created a driver registration system for ArcBest with the goal of improving driver retention. 鈥For the use case, we chose to create a system that would bring in information from government, law enforcement, and independent company databases and api’s. We would store the information within ledgers that would be interconnected through a BlockChain, and that chain of ledgers would be sorted and rated by a neural network,鈥 Butler said. 鈥淎 neural network is basically a self-improving algorithm that would learn and adapt like the human brain. Our neural network would be able to pull up ledgers about 听and assign ratings towards the drivers within a mobile app that both drivers and employers could use. The mobile app would allow drivers to see in real-time how well they’re performing and it could become a tool for them to use when looking for a job, and because they could see how they’re doing in their current position.鈥 Watts, a senior information science major from Bryant, and her team, sudoIntellectual, created an electronic bill of lading system for J.B. Hunt that they named 鈥淭ruck Hunt.鈥 鈥How does Truck Hunt work? When a carrier arrives at the shipper, as pallets are loaded into the truck, RFID or smart pallets can track what is loaded in the truck. Then the carrier gives a tablet to the shipper that then uses facial recognition to cryptographically sign the bill of lading. As the carrier goes from point A to point B, there are sensors in the truck that collect the temperature data, GPS, and acceleration,鈥 Watts said. 鈥淥nce the carrier arrives at the receiver, the truck is unloaded and the receiver verifies that everything was arrived in order and they both cryptographically sign the bill of lading. At the point the pdf is finalized and the hash is stored on the blockchain. If there is a dispute then the data from the sensors is also stored on the BlockChain.鈥 further explained Watts, who鈥檚 team has since been invited to present their project to J.B. Hunt鈥檚 executive committee. Watts鈥 teammate Michael DiCicco, a junior information science major from Benton, credits 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock with providing him with the opportunity to travel, network, and compete at hackathons across the country. 鈥淚鈥檝e enjoyed getting to travel so much, and I鈥檝e gotten to go everywhere from Las Vegas to Alabama,鈥 DiCicco said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 also helped me become a better communicator, and I always come back with good takeaways.鈥 Pierce and the rest of 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock鈥檚 information science faculty could not be more pleased with their students鈥 performance. 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 amazing that they went in and did so well against competitors with more experience than them, I鈥檓 always looking forward to what they鈥檒l show us next!鈥 she said. Eight 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students reached the hackathon’s finals, including (from L to R): Ian Thompson, Michael DiCicco, Karen Watts, Brock Butler, Aaron David, and Hunter Wright.  ]]>