February 2022
Newsletter
Message from the Division President

Dear QCRE members and friends,
 
Please check out our new YouTube channel for IISE/QCRE for recorded QCRE research webinars from distinguished researchers and scholars. Our YouTube channel features the recorded webinars offered by Dr. Hui Yang and Dr. Enrico Zio. More are coming.


The QCRE track of the 2022 IISE annual conference will feature the special sessions below: best student paper competition, best track paper competition, poster competition, and industrial data challenge. These are great opportunities to recognize outstanding research work from our members. We are also very excited to announce the first QCRE Teaching Award. QCRE is not in short of excellent scholar teachers. I encourage you to participate and keep an eye on the announcement for award solicitation.
 
On behalf of the QCRE Board of Directors, I wish you a happy and prosperous 2022!

Sincerely,

Linkan Bian, Ph.D.
IISE QCRE Division President (2021-2022)
Thomas B. & Terri L. Nusz Associate Professor
Industrial and Systems Engineering
Mississippi State University 
Call for Papers: QCRE Best Student Paper Competition 2022

The Quality Control and Reliability Engineering (QCRE) division of the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE) is sponsoring a student paper competition as part of the IISE Annual Conference & Expo, May 21 – May 24, 2022, in Seattle, WA. The purpose of this competition is to honor outstanding papers in the field of quality and/or reliability engineering research and practice. Awards will be presented at the QCRE Town Hall meeting during the 2022 IISE Virtual Annual Conference & Expo. The winner will be acknowledged in the QCRE newsletter and website. 

Eligibility Criteria
  • The paper topic must fit the QCRE themes.
  • The student must be the first author. Moreover, a formal, signed statement by the student’s advisor must be submitted along with the paper affirming that the majority of original results presented in the paper are due to the student’s efforts rather than the advisor or other collaborators involved in the work.
  • The paper must have been completed during the first author’s (i.e., student’s) undergraduate or graduate studies.
  • Previous finalists who wish to compete again should submit an entirely different paper. Please note, however, that past winners are not eligible for the competition.
  • The first author (i.e., the student) must be an IISE QCRE member and be willing and able to present the paper in the QCRE student paper competition session at the IISE Annual Conference & Expo.
  • The paper must present original research results and cannot be accepted for publication elsewhere at the time of submission (it can, however, be submitted and/or under review for possible publication at the time of submission for this competition).
  • The paper must not have won or been considered for an award in another competition.

Important Notes
  • Papers submitted for this competition will NOT be published in the ISERC proceedings.
  • IISE and the QCRE division do NOT own the copyrights of the papers submitted for this competition. However, the papers must be available to the QCRE division to be posted on their web page.

Formatting and Submission Guidelines
  • Papers must be 8-10 pages long (1-inch margins, single column, single-spaced, 12-point font, and Times New Roman) and must begin with a 50-word abstract. The submitted papers must follow the format or will be returned without review.
  • Entrants must submit both a blinded and an unblinded version of the paper along with a formal signed statement from the student’s advisor, all in electronic format (.PDF files ONLY), to competition coordinators, Dr. Mingyang Li, (mingyangli@usf.edu), Dr. Na Zou (nzou1@tamu.edu), Dr. Chen Kan (chen.kan@uta.edu) by 03/11/2022.
  • Late or incomplete submissions will be ineligible for the competition.
  • All submitted papers will be reviewed and ranked by a review committee, and four finalists will be selected and announced on 04/15/2022
QCRE Webinar Series

In 2021, we were honored to have webinars from two distinguished speakers:
  • Dr. Hui Yang, Professor of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Bioengineering, The Penn State University. Recording of his presentation “Sensor-based Modeling and Optimization of Additive Manufacturing” is available at:


  • Dr. Enrico Zio, Professor of MINES ParisTech, PSL Research University, CRC, Sophia Antipolis, France & Professor of the Energy Department, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy. Recording of his presentation “ Intelligent Risk Management by Artificial Intelligence” is available at:

Call for Participation: QCRE & ProcessMiner Industrial Data Challenge Competition
The QCRE division of IISE is inviting all IISE members to participate in the 2022 QCRE Data Challenge Competition at the 2022 Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers Annual Conference, May 21-24, 2022. This year's QCRE Data Challenge problem is sponsored by ProcessMiner Inc.

In this data challenge, a research problem to advance the field of deep learning is posed to participants. Participants are encouraged to work in teams and to start soon to make the best use of the duration of the challenge. There is no limit on the number of participants allowed in one team. The finalist teams will be required to present their work at the 2022 IISE Annual Conference. For more details about the challenge description and requirements, please refer to the following CFP: https://lnkd.in/dpSr6qTx

  • Deadline: April 29, 2022.
  • First Prize: Plaque & $2,000
  • Second Prize: Plaque & $1,000

For inquiries and registration, please contact the competition steering committee: Dr. Chitta Ranjan (ProcessMiner Inc.) at cranjan@processminer.com and Dr. Yisha Xiang (Texas Tech University) at yisha.xiang@ttu.edu.
Call for Participation: Student Introduction and Interaction Session

The QCRE division is inviting student members to participate in the Student Introduction and Interaction Session at IISE Annual Conference 2022. This session is designed for QCRE student members to build their professional network, show up their talents, and learn from invited guests. Each student will be given three minutes to deliver a brief speech about his/her research interests and accomplishments. Senior QCRE members will be invited to discuss opportunities for students, job market preparation (academic vs. industry), and interact with the attendees.
 
Participation in this session is free of charge if registered for the conference. The session plans to have around 10 student speakers due to the limited capacity. Students who are on the job market and/or have poster presentations will be given higher priority. For inquiries and registration, please contact the chair of the Student Introduction and Interaction Session Dr. Xiaolei Fang at xfang8@ncsu.edu and Dr. Ahmed Aziz​ Ezzat at aa2085@rutgers.edu.
Featured QCRE Student Members
Sahand Hajifar is pursuing his Ph.D. in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at University at Buffalo. He received a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from Iran University of Science and Technology in 2015 and a master’s degree in Industrial Engineering from Sharif University of Technology in 2017. His research interests include data analytics, graph signal processing, statistical signal processing, transfer learning and their applications in manufacturing, ergonomics and healthcare. In 2021, he was the winner of 2021 IISE QCRE Best Student Paper Competition, UB Outstanding Research, Scholarship and Creativity Project and UB Sigma Xi "Companions in Zealous Research" awards. He is a student member of IISE and INFORMS and an associate member of Sigma Xi. His membership in the QCRE community dates back to March 2021 and when he participated in the 2021 QCRE Best Student Paper Competition. He found the competition a unique opportunity to become acquainted with researchers at the cutting edge of quality and reliability.
Yuxuan Li is a third-year Ph.D. student from school of industrial engineering and management, Oklahoma State University. He also holds a bachelor’s degree from Renmin University of China. He is interested in adversarial learning-assisted data analytics in manufacturing and healthcare. He is the recipient of INFORMS QSR data challenge award finalist, best poster award of BOOM workshop in IJCAI, and the Roy & Virginia Dorrough Graduate Fellowship at OSU. He is also a member of IISE, INFORMS, and IEEE. He has become a member of the QCRE division since March, 2020. During these two years, resources from QCRE such as the social media, as well as the events organized by QCRE such as the webinars and conference sessions, helped him improve a lot. Besides, the QCRE division have also provided him valuable networking opportunities to connect to more people in the community.
QCRE Member Spotlight - Dr. Wenmeng Tian

In each issue of QCRE newsletter, we will feature one outstanding QCRE member who has demonstrated the excellence in the QCRE related fields. In this issue, we feature our outstanding junior faculty member, Dr. Wenmeng Tian, who is an Assistant Professor of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISE) at Mississippi State University (MSU). She received her Ph.D. degree in ISE from Virginia Tech in 2017. She also holds an M.S. degree in Statistics from Virginia Tech, an M.S. and a B.S. degree in ISE from Tianjin University, China. Her research vision is to leverage advanced sensing and analytics to accelerate the scale up of various advanced manufacturing processes through the fundamental research on process modeling, monitoring, and prognosis. Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Defense (DoD), the Department of Labor (DoL), and industrial institutes. She received the NSF CAREER Award in 2021. She is now serving as the External Relations Director at the IISE Manufacturing and Design (M&D) division, and the faculty advisor for the IISE Student Chapter at MSU. She is a member of IISE and INFORMS.

Here is Wenmeng’s Story with QCRE.
 
What is your current position and role?   
I am an Assistant Professor of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISE) at Mississippi State University. My research group focuses on data analytics for advanced manufacturing systems performance improvement. Furthermore, I’ve been teaching multiple ISE courses related to manufacturing processes and data analytics. I also serve as the faculty advisor for the IISE Student Chapter at MSU.

What are your experiences with QCRE division at IISE?
I have been a member of QCRE since I started my job as an Assistant Professor at MSU in 2017. Since then, I have been actively participating in QCRE activities, including session organization, conference presentation, conference paper review, etc. Recently, I’ve been collaborating with QCRE board members in organizing joint webinars for the members of both QCRE and M&D divisions.

How have these experiences helped you in preparing yourself for your career?
Over the years, the QCRE family has provided tremendous support and inspiration in my academic career development. QCRE has offered me a great platform to connect with new colleagues, seek advice from great mentors, learn most cutting-edge research, and disseminate my own work with whom sharing the same passion for QCRE-related studies.

What are the achievements you are proudest of?
I’m most proud of the graduation of my first PhD advisee and my first master’s advisee! With the recent support from NSF, my research group can help more young talents to fulfill their academic and career goals.
Any suggestions to future fellow students?
Active participation in the QCRE activities is a great plus for all students! Various activities (such as conference presentations, competition participations, and session organizations) will help broadening your horizon, improving your interpersonal skills, growing your network, and overall, becoming more prepared for your future professional life. 
2022 IISE Annual Conference & Expo
The IISE Annual Conference & Expo 2021 will return to in-person for the first time since 2019. It will be held on May 21 – 24, 2022 in Seattle, Washington. The QCRE Division of the Institute of the Institute of Industrial & Systems Engineers (IISE) will be sponsoring the QCRE Track at the 2022 IISE Annual Conference and Expo.
Call for Entries to the Division's Quarterly Newsletter

The division is publishing its quarterly newsletters and hereby soliciting news entries. This is a great opportunity to showcase interesting yet impactful researches, professional practices and educational efforts within the division. The solicited story will go into the following blocks in the newsletter: Research on the News, Practical Applications, and Education and Outreach. It would be great if you could: 

  1. Prepare your story write-up within 300 words (write it in plain language for diverse audiences).
  2. Provide a nice picture together with the story.
  3. Provide a link (if possible) to a detail version of the story (hyperlink to your project public webpage, etc.).

Please email your information and materials to Dr. Chen Kan at chen.kan@uta.edu Your entry will appear in the next available division newsletter. 

PDF version of our newsletters are available for our members on the IISE Connect (QCRE division Library folder), as well as our Facebook Page, LinkedIn Profile, and Twitter.
Please Reach Us At: 
Have you considered a corporate membership? If not, why? Companies large and small enjoy the benefits. Include your entire team and receive all the benefits of individual membership, plus lowest rates to attend the Conferences and much more.
 
Contact Doug Long IISE Global Director for Strategic Alliances for more details.