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Contact Information: Sheryl Weinstein Public Relations 973-596-3436

NJIT Computer Scientist Receives IBM Award

NEWARK, Jan 30 2004

A computer scientist at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) has received a $19,000 award for his innovative use of IBM software.

Barry Cohen, Ph.D., an assistant professor of computer science who has taught at NJIT for three years, has been recognized for coming up with a new application for IBM's "Eclipse."

Cohen has devised a way to use Eclipse to teach computer science courses.  He plans to use the prize money to train teaching assistants to help with the courses and to write a manual.

The software is IBM's contribution to the "open source" movement--the practice of offering software without the need to pay licensing fees. Cohen describes Eclipse as "a workbench for anything and everything--you can plug in any tool." 

IBM built the Eclipse software for its own in-house use, and then later decided to "open-source" it, he said. 

Cohen, who lives in New York City, received his Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

NJIT, New Jersey's science and technology university, enrolls more than 9,558 students pursuing bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in 120 programs. The university consists of six colleges: Newark College of Engineering, College of Architecture and Design, College of Science and Liberal Arts, School of Management, College of Computing Sciences and Albert Dorman Honors College. U.S. News & World Report's 2011 Annual Guide to America's Best Colleges ranked NJIT in the top tier of national research universities. NJIT is internationally recognized for being at the edge in knowledge in architecture, applied mathematics, wireless communications and networking, solar physics, advanced engineered particulate materials, nanotechnology, neural engineering and e-learning. Many courses and certificate programs, as well as graduate degrees, are available online through the Office of Continuing Professional Education.