Education 

• 1993 – Ph.D. Computer Science - Illinois Institute of Technology
• 1981 – M.S. Computer Information Science – Andrews University
• 1975 – B.A. Religion – Andrews University

Brief Biography 

Dr. Wolfer has served IUSB students as a faculty member of the Computer Science and Information Systems department since 2001. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Illinois Institute of Technology where he applied aspects of biologically-inspired computing to computer vision in Landsat satellite imagery. Since that time Dr. Wolfer’s research has expanded to include intelligent systems applied to a variety of domains such as medicine, textual analysis, and art, as well as computer science and engineering pedagogy.

Achievements 

Dr. Wolfer is an AT&T/SBC Fellow, awarded for integrating robotics into the computer science curriculum. He currently serves on several international program committees such as IEEE EDUCON and the Eurographics Education Committee and holds memberships in the Institute for Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the Association for Computing Machinery, the Society for Information Informatics in Medicine, and the Radiological Society of North America among others.

Patent: Structured Speech Recognition, U.S. Patent Number: 7,155,447 while working with Ascend Health Information Technology., a superb group of professionals embedding clinical domain knowledge into software for the medical industry.

Research Interests 

My research interests are bifurcated, but not mutually exclusive:

1. Exploring naturally inspired algorithms such as Genetic Programming, Deep Learning, and Pulse-Coupled Neural Networks for “real world” applications, most recently medical imaging, remote sensing, and art.
2. Computer Science pedagogy.

Teaching

In addition to the normal teaching assignments, I have attempted to raise student awareness of contemporary technologies and applications whenever feasible. For example, I have: Sponsored three students in the IUSB SMART Summer Fellowship program. The project titles:

• “Application of Self-Organizing Maps to Texture Visualization and Analysis”, 2002
• “Assessing Pulse Coupled Neural Network Potential for Malignant Lesion Detecting in Screening Mammography”, 2007
• *Haptic Palpation of Aortic Pressure with ECG Derived Time Intervals, 2014

Awarded an AT&T/SBC Fellowship to introduce robotics as a programming problem for the computer organization course. Introduced haptic computer interfaces for the graphics and general education courses.

Selected Publications

• Joel C. Adams and Jacob Caswell and Suzanne J. Matthews and Charles Peck and
• Elizabeth Shoop and David Toth and James Wolfer “ The Micro- Cluster Showcase: 7
• Inexpensive Beowulf Clusters for Teaching PDC ” Proceedings of the ACM Technical
• Symposium on Computing Science Education, pp 82-83, 2016.
• William J. Keeler and James Wolfer “ A Raspberry PI Cluster and Geiger Counter Supporting Random Number Acquisition in the CS Operating Systems Class ” Proceedings International Conference on Remote Engineering and Virtual Instrumentation, February, 2016
• Alexander LeClair and James Wolfer “ Haptic Representation of Aortic Pressure Waveforms Using Synthetic ECG Derived Time Intervals ” Proceedings Exp.At International Conference on Online Experimentation, 2015
• Susan L. Gordon and James Wolfer “ Haptic Support for Teaching Computer Science Classes with Biomedical and Robotics Contexts ” Book Chapter, Emergent Technologies and the Internet of Things, 2015
• James Wolfer “ A Heterogeneous Supercomputer Model for High-Performance Parallel
• Computing Pedagogy ” Proceedings IEEE Educon, Special Track - Information Technology and Engineering Pedagogy, 2015
• Susan L. Gordon, Jeffrey Soble, and James Wolfer “ Pulse-Coupled Neural Network
• Lumen Segmentation for Shape-Based Plaque Prediction in CT Imagery of the Thoracic
• Aorta ” Proceedings International Conference on Medical Imaging using Bio-Inspired and Soft Computing, May, 2013
• James Wolfer, “ Exploring Extreme Learning Machines for Identifying Roads in Landsat-
• 4 Thematic Mapper Imagery ” Proceedings Safety, Health, and Environment World Congress, July, 2012
• Robert P. Batzinger and James Wolfer, “ Normalized Compression Distance with Typographical Errors: A Preliminary Assessment ” Proceedings World Congress on Communication and Arts, April, 2011
• James Wolfer, “ Bit Depth Reduction: Assessing the Impact on Pulse-Coupled Neural Network Mammogram Pre-Processing ”, Proceedings of the Safety, Health, and Environment World Congress, July, 2009
• Charles K. Guse, Susan L. Gordon, A. Blake Robertson, James Wolfer, “Exploring the
• Pulse Coupled Neural Network for Mammogram Preprocessing: A Preliminary Assessment ”, Proceedings of the Safety, Health, and Environment World Congress, July, 2008 p21-25