In honor of its 80th anniversary, “The Wizard of Oz” returns to over 700 select theaters nationwide on Jan. 27, 29 and 30, courtesy of Fathom Events and Turner Classic Movies. The beloved classic will include an exclusive commentary by TCM host Ben Mankiewicz.
The 1939 musical fantasy film, based on the 1900 children’s book by L. Frank Baum, starred Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale, a young girl who dreams of more than her life on a small Kansas farm and suddenly finds herself whisked away by a tornado to the magical world of Oz.
The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film was nominated for several Academy Awards upon its release, including Best Picture, which it lost to “Gone with the Wind” but won for Best Song (“Over the Rainbow”) and Best Original Score.
Considered to be one of the greatest films in cinema history, “The Wizard of Oz” was one of the earliest films to be deemed “culturally significant” by the United States Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
Participating movie theaters in our neck of the woods includeAMC Loews Stony Brook 17, 2196 Nesconset Highway, Stony Brook on Jan. 27 at 2 and 5 p.m., Jan. 29 and 30 at 7 p.m.; and Island 16 Cinema de Lux, 185 Morris Ave., Holtsville on Jan. 30 at 7 p.m. To purchase your ticket in advance, visit www.fathomevents.com.
I’ve always loved beets. My mother used to make wonderful pickled beets. And like so many then unpopular veggies she made, beets, along with kale, Swiss chard, kohlrabi and cauliflower, have finally been recognized as not only delicious but also healthful.
Consider roasted beet salad with goat cheese and walnuts. Order up a plate of beet ravioli or risotto at one of the trendy Italian restaurants or have a bowl of beet soup with a snowy dollop of yogurt or sour cream floating on top. Or best of all, try my mom’s pickled beets. Beets and a whole new generation of veggies have come into their own or maybe it’s just a whole new generation that has discovered them.
Pureed Beet Soup with Yogurt
Pureed Beet Soup with Yogurt
YIELD: Makes 4 servings
INGREDIENTS:
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
2½–3 cups chicken broth
4 cooked beets, chopped
1 cup canned diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill or 1 teaspoon dried
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
½ cup half and half
1 cup plain yogurt or sour cream
4 sprigs fresh dill for garnish
DIRECTIONS:
In a small skillet over medium heat, sauté onion in olive oil 5 minutes or until opaque. In a large saucepan combine chicken broth, beets, tomatoes, onion and dill. Bring to a boil, then simmer, uncovered, 10 minutes. Remove from heat, adjust salt and pepper and let cool slightly. In a food processor or blender, puree in batches until smooth; add a little water if mixture is too thick. Return to saucepan and reheat over medium-low heat or cover and refrigerate if not using immediately. When ready to serve ladle into 4 plates and swirl a little of the half and half through soup, top with a dollop of yogurt or sour cream and sprig of dill. Serve with buttered toasted seeded rye bread.
Roasted Beet Salad with Goat Cheese and Walnuts
Roasted Beet Salad with Goat Cheese and Walnuts
YIELD: Makes 4 servings
INGREDIENTS:
4 whole beets
8 peeled garlic cloves
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh thyme or 1 teaspoon dried
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon raspberry vinegar
1 tablespoon orange juice
1 teaspoon honey
1 teaspoon prepared Dijon mustard
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1 cup torn frisée
1 cup arugula
1 cup halved cherry tomatoes
4 ounces crumbled goat cheese
½ cup chopped toasted walnuts
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 375 F. Scrub, peel and chop beets; peel garlic cloves. In a medium bowl toss the beets and garlic with the two tablespoons of oil, thyme and salt and pepper. Line a 9×13-inch baking pan with aluminum foil and spread beet mixture evenly over it. Roast 25 to 35 minutes, until tender. Meanwhile in a small bowl, whisk together the quarter-cup olive oil, vinegars, orange juice, honey, mustard and salt and pepper. Remove beets from oven; let cool 10 minutes. Toss frisée and arugula and place on salad plates; place tomatoes on top of greens, then beets, goat cheese and walnuts and drizzle with oil and vinegar mixture. Serve at room temperature as a side dish or appetizer accompanied by crunchy baguette slices..
Mom’s Pickled Beets
Mom’s Pickled Beets
YIELD: Makes 4 to 6 servings
INGREDIENTS:
¼ cup apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
4 to 6 medium beets, pared, chopped and cooked
1 medium onion, chopped
DIRECTIONS:
In a large bowl whisk together the vinegar, sugar and salt and pepper. Add the beets and onion and toss to thoroughly coat. Cover, and stirring frequently, refrigerate 3 to 4 hours. Serve at room temperature with pot roast or goulash and noodles.
In Theatre Three’s latest children’s show, the audience is invited to enter the magical world of “Jack & the Beanstalk” or “The Boy Who Cried Giant!” Written by Jeffrey Sanzel and Kevin F. Story, the musical combines the classic English fairy tale with the well-known fable “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” to produce a most entertaining afternoon.
Jack (Eric J. Hughes) lives with his mother (Ginger Dalton) and his best friend Filpail the Cow (Nicole Bianco). Although he is a nice boy, Jack tends to exaggerate and has told so many tall tales that no one believes him anymore. “Someday your stories are going to get you in trouble,” warns his mother. Jack also receives a visit from the Fairy Mary Goodwing (Michelle LaBozzetta) who tries to convince him to “always tell the truth and you will be true to yourself.”
One day his mother tells him that they have no other choice than to sell Filpail to Butcher Blackstone (Steven Uihlein). On the way to the market Jack and his cow bump into two gypsies, Marco and Margot (Andrew Lenahan and Brielle Levenberg), who claim they want to buy Filpail for “cowpanionship” and trick Jack into trading her for some magic beans.
Jack’s mother is furious when she finds out what happened and throws the beans away. A giant beanstalk suddenly appears, and when Jack climbs it he discovers a castle in the sky occupied by a cranky giant, the giant’s wife (Suzie Dunn), a golden harp and a hen that lays golden eggs. But with Jack’s poor track record, will anyone believe him?
Under the direction of Jeffrey Sanzel, an energetic cast of eight adult actors play multiple roles during this thrilling adventure. From the first musical number, “Ballad of Jack’s Device/Song of Boasting,” accompanied on piano by Douglas Quattrock, you know you’re in for a fun treat.
Costume designers Teresa Matteson and Toni St. John have outdone themselves this time with colorful outfits; “giant” props, including a three-foot-long sneaker; and a beanstalk that magically grows all the way to the ceiling. The creative and polished choreography by Nicole Bianco pulls it all together nicely.
Come in out of the cold and warm up with the magic of “Jack & the Beanstalk!” Audiences of all ages will love this wonderful show. Meet the cast in the lobby after the show for photos.
Theatre Three, located at 412 Main St., Port Jefferson will present “Jack & the Beanstalk” through Feb. 23. Children’s Theatre continues with “The Three Little Kittens” from March 2 to 23 and “The Adventures of Peter Rabbit” from April 13 to 27. All seats are $10. For more information or to order, call 928-9100 or visit www.theatrethree.com.
Look into my eyes …You are getting veerrrry sleepy. Your eyelids are feeling heavy and you are now asleep. When you awaken you will get into your car and drive to Kent Animal Shelter. You will visit the kitty cottage and meet a wonderful loving 8-month-old kitten by the name of Vivaldi. You will adopt me (Vivaldi). You will then bring me home to live with you where you will serve me by giving me plenty of food, lots of petting and enough loving until I can’t take anymore! When I meow you will awaken and embark on your journey … MEOW!! See you soon!
Vivaldi comes neutered, microchipped, and up to date on vaccines. Kent Animal Shelter is located at 2259 River Road in Calverton. The adoption center is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. every day. For more information on Vivaldi the hypnotist and other adoptable pets at Kent, call 631-727-5731 or visit www.kentanimalshelter.com.
A STORY OF RESISTANCE: From left, actors Julia Lewenfisz-Gorka, Wojciech Zielinski and Marta Ormaniec portray Ora, Abraham and Luba Lewin in a ghetto street scene from the film.
Photo by Anna Wloch/Katahdin Productions
By Donna Newman
“History is written by the victors” is a quote often attributed to Winston Churchill. Some allege that history is written by the survivors. In at least one unique case, however, history was written by people who were neither victors nor survivors. During the Holocaust of World War II, a historical record was assembled by a group of doomed Polish Jews with only one goal: to let the truth be known.
Actor Wojciech Zielinski as Oyneg Shabes member Abraham Lewin. Photo by Anna Wloch
As designated by the United Nations in 2005, International Holocaust Remembrance Day has been observed each year since on Jan. 27 — the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi death camp. On that date this year, the world can see the global premiere of a new documentary, “Who Will Write Our History,” detailing the trove of evidence regarding life, atrocities and death within the Warsaw Ghetto, as compiled and buried before the ghetto’s destruction by Jewish inmates who were imprisoned there.
As part of an international event, the film will screen simultaneously at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., and at the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles. These are just three of the more than 250 venues in 41 countries around the world taking part in this unprecedented event, with more joining daily.
Here in Suffolk County, the film may only be viewed at North Shore Jewish Center, 385 Old Town Road, Port Jefferson Station, at 3:30 p.m. The suggested donation is $10 per person. Call 631-928-3737 to RSVP.
“Who Will Write Our History” is a documentary film based on a book by the same name written by Trinity College Professor Samuel Kassow who was born in 1946 in a displaced persons camp in Stuttgart, Germany. The film was written, produced and directed by award-winning filmmaker Roberta Grossman; the executive producer is Nancy Spielberg.
Men praying in Warsaw Ghetto in a scene from the film.
Both book and documentary tell the story of the secret society — code named Oyneg Shabes, or joy of the Sabbath — composed of journalists, scholars and community leaders who were among the 450,000 Jews confined to the Warsaw Ghetto, the largest in Nazi-occupied Europe, beginning in November 1940.
The website for the documentary introduces the film: “‘Who Will Write Our History’ is a story of resistance. It is a story about who gets to tell the story. It is about a group of spiritual resistors who risked their lives so that the truth would survive, even if they did not.”
Leading this band of resistance fighters was historian Emanuel Ringelblum, who masterminded“one of the most astonishing research projects in human history” according to Culture.pl, a government-sponsored website funded by Poland’s Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.
The archive that Ringelblum’s team of about 50 to 60 individuals assembled contains approximately 6,000 documents, written in Yiddish and Polish. Artifacts also collected include newspapers, ration and tram tickets, letters, postcards, leaflets, German orders, theater posters and candy wrappers. Original literary pieces and works of art — drawings, watercolors and cartoons — were also deposited in the archive.
Shortly after the war, the first hidden cache to be unearthed was discovered on Sept. 18, 1946. A second trove was found in 1950. A third stash, which has yet to be located despite a 2003 excavation attempt, is thought to be buried on the grounds of the Chinese embassy in Warsaw.
A Warsaw Ghetto market scene from the film.
North Shore Jewish Center congregants Marsha Belford and her husband, Wlodek Guryn, learned about the documentary last spring at the 2018 Hillel and Jewish Theological Seminary-sponsored Jewish University for a Day held at Stony Brook University.
In a plenary session, not only did Grossman talk about and show a clip of the film, which was then in production, but Dr. Eleonora Bergman ofthe Ringelblum Archive also spoke.
“Bringing this documentary to our synagogue started with my husband’s friendship with Eleonora Bergman, who is also a Polish Jew and who grew up on the same street in Warsaw as he did,” said Belford in a recent interview. “Dr. Bergman served as director of the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw [2007-2011] and is still very much involved with the Ringelblum Archive.”
For her extensive work, Bergman received the French Légion d’Honneur in 2012. She and Prof. Tadeusz Epsztein shared the 2017 Jan Karski and Pola Nireneka Prize, awarded by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research for their work coordinating the publication of the Ringelblum Archive.
Belford patiently awaited the film’s release because she appreciates Holocaust testimonies for very personal reasons. “My husband’s parents escaped Pinsk and survived the war as Jewish refugees in the Soviet Union,” she said. “Originally from Hungary, my mother — whose entire family was murdered by the Nazis — was a survivor of the Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps.”
Members of the cast
When Belford learned that the documentary would be shown at the U.N. as part of its International Holocaust Remembrance Week observances and also at the Holocaust Memorial & Tolerance Center of Nassau County in Glen Cove — but nowhere in Suffolk County — she contacted the organizer of NSJC’s annual Jewish film festival, Robin Appel.
Belford is grateful to Appel for her expertise and assistance in obtaining the film. “It was Robin who handled all the negotiations that made the NSJC screening possible,” she said.
North Shore Jewish Center Rabbi Aaron Bensen is delighted to offer the community a chance to see this important film.
“I am tremendously proud to be hosting this screening,” said Benson. “We’ve held an annual Jewish film festival for a decade now, thanks to a team that researches and selects excellent Jewish, Israeli and Holocaust-themed films. Bringing ‘Who Will Write Our History’ to the area is a major accomplishment for the group.”
“We’re also happy to be partnering with Temple Isaiah [in Stony Brook] as sponsors,” he added, “since it is a wonderful opportunity to engage a broader audience on this important topic.”
After the war, Rachel Auerbach — one of only three members of Oyneg Shabes to survive — noted the importance of informing the wider world: “We wrote, collected, guarded and hid while in the circumstances of our own destruction. We prepared the register of our own suffering and death, not for ourselves, but for other Jews. For the Jewish community of the wide world.”
Thanks to Auerbach and her courageous cohorts, that perspective will reach the eyes and ears of Suffolk County and beyond Jan. 27 via the film “Who Will Write Our History.”
From left, Jayson Elliott (The Big Bopper), Michael Perrie Jr. (Buddy Holly) and Diego Guevara (Ritchie Valens)
Skye Scott, Michael Perrie Jr. and Armando Gutierrez
Michael Perrie Jr. and cast of 'Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story'
Skye Scott, Michael Perrie Jr., Armando Gutierrez and Sam Sherwood
Armando Gutierrez, Sam Sherwood, Michael Perrie Jr. and Franca Vercelloni
From left, Armando Gutierrez, Skye Scott, Michael Perrie Jr., and Sam Sherwood
Michael Perrie Jr. is Buddy Holly
Michael Perrie Jr. and Lauren Cosio in a scene from the show
Michael Perrie Jr. as Buddy Holly
By Heidi Sutton
February 3rd of this year will mark the 60th anniversary of the death of Buddy Holly, one of rock ‘n’ roll’s true pioneers who, in his short career, had a major influence on the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton and Elton John.
Holly’s wonderful music, his lasting legacy to the world, is celebrated in Alan Janes’ “Buddy —The Buddy Holly Story.” The jukebox musical debuted in London in 1989 and arrived a year later on Broadway. The show opened at the John W. Engeman Theater last week and runs through March 3.
Directed and choreographed by Keith Andrews, the show recounts the last three years of Holly’s life and rise to fame, from 1956 to 1959.
We first meet him as a strong-willed 19-year-old country singer (played by Michael Perrie Jr.) from Lubbock, Texas, and follow his journey with his band, Buddy Holly and the Crickets, as they venture into rock ‘n’ roll with hits like “That’ll Be the Day,” “Rock Around with Ollie Vee” and “Everyday.”
The impressive sets by Jordan Janota and props by Emily Wright beautifully evolve with each scene while the stage features a permanent arch of gramophone records that light up individually as each hit is performed.
Touring the country in 1957, Holly and his band head to the Apollo Theater in Harlem where the audience is treated to a show-stopping rendition of the Isley Brothers’s “Shout” by Apollo performers Marlena (Kim Onah) and Tyrone (Troy Valjean Rucker) before enjoying “Peggy Sue,” “Oh, Boy!” and “Not Fade Away.”
We are witness to when Holly meets his future wife Maria Elena Santiago (Lauren Cosio) for the first time and when he leaves a pregnant Maria in 1959 to go on the Winter Dance Party tour by bus to play 24 Midwestern cities in as many days after promising her he won’t get on an airplane.
The final scene is also one of the show’s finest as Holly’s last performance at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, with J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson (Jayson Elliott) and Ritchie Valens (Diego Guevara) is recreated in a poignant tribute. The audience is transported back in time and become concertgoers enjoyingoutstanding performances of “Chantilly Lace,” “La Bamba” and “Peggy Sue Got Married.”
The stage suddenly goes dark and a radio announces that all three singers were killed in a plane crash shortly after the concert. Richardson was 28, Holly was 22 and Valens was only 17. The tragedy was later referred to as “The Day the Music Died.” The lights come back on and the concert continues, bringing the packed house at last Friday’s show to their feet in a long-standing ovation.
By the end of the night, more than 20 of Holly’s greatest hits have been played live by the incredibly talented actors on stage, a fitting tribute to the Texan who got to play music his way.
The John W. Engeman Theater, 250 Main St., Northport will present “Buddy — The Buddy Holly Story” through March 3. Tickets range from $73 to $78 with free valet parking. For more information or to order, call 631-261-2900 or visit www.engemantheater.com.
Diabetic retinopathy can lead to blurred vision and blindness
By David Dunaief, M.D.
Dr. David Dunaief
With diabetes, we tend to concentrate on stabilization of the disease as a whole. This is a good thing. However, there is not enough attention spent on microvascular (small vessel disease) complications of diabetes, specifically diabetic retinopathy, which is an umbrella term.
This disease, a complication of diabetes that is related to sugar control, can lead to blurred vision and blindness. There are at least three different disorders that make up diabetic retinopathy. These are dot and blot hemorrhages, proliferative diabetic retinopathy and diabetic macular edema. The latter two are the most likely disorders to cause vision loss. Our focus for this article will be on diabetic retinopathy as a whole and on diabetic macular edema, more specifically.
Diabetic retinopathy is the number one cause of vision loss in those who are 25 to 74 years old (1). Risk factors include duration of diabetes, glucose (sugar) that is not well controlled, smoking, high blood pressure, kidney disease, pregnancy and high cholesterol (2).
What is diabetic macula edema, also referred to as DME? This disorder is swelling, due to extracellular fluid accumulating in the macula (3). The macula is a yellowish oval spot in the central portion of the retina — in the inner segment of the back of the eye — and it is sensitive to light. The macula is the region with greatest visual acuity. When fluid builds up from blood vessels leaking, there is potential loss of vision.
The highest risk factor for DME is for those with the longest duration of diabetes (4). DME is traditionally treated with lasers. But intravitreal (intraocular — within the eye) injections of a medication known as ranibizumab (Lucentis) may be as effective as laser. Unfortunately, many patients are diagnosed with DME after it has already caused vision loss. If not treated after having DME for a year or more, patients can experience permanent loss of vision (5).
In a cross-sectional study (a type of observational study) using NHANES data from 2005-2008, among patients with DME, only 45 percent were told by a physician that diabetes had affected their eyes (6). Approximately 46 percent of patients reported that they had not been to a diabetic nurse educator, nutritionist or dietitian in more than a year — or never.
The problem is that the symptoms of vision loss don’t necessarily occur until the latter stages of the disorder. According to the authors, there needs to be an awareness campaign about the importance of getting your eyes examined on an annual basis if you have diabetes. Many patients are unaware of the association between vision loss and diabetes.
Treatment options: lasers and injections
There seems to be a potential paradigm shift in DME treatment. Traditionally, patients had been treated with lasers. The results from a randomized controlled trial, the gold standard of studies, showed that intravitreal (delivery directly into the eye) injections with ranibizumab, whether given prompt laser treatments or treatments delayed for at least 24 weeks, were equally effective in treating DME (7).
Increased risk with diabetes drugs
Diabetic retinopathy is the number one cause of vision loss in ages 25 to 74. Stock photo
You would think that drugs to treat type 2 diabetes would prevent DME from occurring as well. However, in the THIN trial, a retrospective (backward-looking) study, a class of diabetes drugs, thiazolidinediones, which includes Avandia and Actos, actually increased the occurrence of DME compared to those who did not use these oral medications (8). Those receiving these drugs had a 1.3 percent incidence of DME at year one, whereas those who did not had a 0.2 percent incidence. This incidence was persistent through the 10 years of follow-up.
To make matters worse, those who received both thiazolidinediones and insulin had an even greater incidence of DME. There were 103,000 diabetes patients reviewed in this trial. It was unclear whether the drugs, because they were second-line treatments, or the severity of the diabetes itself may have caused these findings.
This is in contrast to a previous ACCORD eye substudy, a cross-sectional analysis, which did not show an association between thiazolidinediones and DME (9). This study involved review of 3,473 participants who had photographs taken of the fundus (the back of the eye).
What does this ultimately mean? Both of these studies were not without weaknesses. It was not clear how long the patients had been using the thiazolidinediones in either study or whether their sugars were controlled and to what degree. The researchers were also unable to control for all other possible confounding factors (10). Thus, there needs to be a prospective (forward-looking) trial done to sort out these results.
Diet
The risk of progression of diabetic retinopathy was significantly lower with intensive blood sugar controls using medications, one of the few positive highlights of the ACCORD trial (11). Medication-induced intensive blood sugar control also resulted in increased mortality and no significant change in cardiovascular events. But an inference can be made: A nutrient-dense, plant-based diet that intensively controls blood sugar is likely to decrease the risk of diabetic retinopathy complications (12, 13).
The best way to avoid diabetic retinopathy is obviously to prevent diabetes. Barring that, it’s to have sugars well controlled. If you or someone you know has diabetes, it is imperative that they get a yearly eye exam from an ophthalmologist so that diabetic retinopathy is detected as early as possible, before permanent vision loss occurs. It is especially important for those diabetes patients who are taking the oral diabetes class thiazolidinediones, which include rosiglitazone (Avandia) and pioglitazone (Actos).
Dr. Dunaief is a speaker, author and local lifestyle medicine physician focusing on the integration of medicine, nutrition, fitness and stress management. For further information, visit www.medicalcompassmd.com or consult your personal physician.
٭We invite you to check out our weekly Medical Compass MD Health Videos on Times Beacon Record News Media’s website, www.tbrnewsmedia.com.٭
From left, graduate students Prakhar Avasthi, Alisa Yurovsky, Charuta Pethe and Haochen Chen with director Steven Skiena, center. Photo by Gary Ghayrat/Stony Brook University
By Daniel Dunaief
Steven Skiena practices what he teaches. Named the director of the Institute for AI-Driven Discovery and Innovation in the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Stony Brook University, Skiena is using artificial intelligence to search for three staff members he hopes to hire in this new initiative.
He is looking for two tenured professors who will work in the Department of Computer Science and one who will be a part of the Department of Biomedical Informatics.
“We hope to use an artificial intelligence screen,” which Skiena calls a Poach-o-matic to “identify candidates we might not have thought of before. Ideally, the program will kick up a name and afterward, we’d bump our hand on our head and say, ‘Of course, this person might be great.’”
Steven Skiena. Photo from SBU
Artificial intelligence and machine learning have become popular areas in research institutions like Stony Brook, as well as in corporations with a wide range of potential applications, including in search engine companies like Google.
Skiena, who is a distinguished teaching professor, said he has “several candidates and we’re now actively interviewing,” adding that many departments on campus have faculty who are interested in applying machine learning in their work.
“There’s been an explosion of people from all disciplines who are interested in this,” Skiena said. He recently met with a materials scientist who uses machine learning techniques to improve experimental data. He’s also talked with people from the business school and from neuroscience.
SBU students have also shown considerable interest in these areas. Last semester, Skiena taught 250 graduate students in his introduction to data science class.
“This is a staggering demand from students that are very excited about this,” he said. Machine learning has become a “part of the standard tool kit for doing mathematical modeling and forecasting in many disciplines and that’s only going to increase.”
In an recent email, Andrew Schwartz, a core faculty at the institute and an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science at Stony Brook, said he believes bringing in new faculty “should attract additional graduate students that may become future leaders in the field.”
Increasing coverage of AI beyond the current expertise in vision, visualization, natural language processing and biomedical engineering can “go a long way. There are a large amount of breakthroughs in AI that seemingly come from taking an idea from one subfield and applying it to another.” Schwartz appreciates the impact Skiena, who is his faculty mentor, has had on the field.
Skiena has “managed to contribute to a wide range of topics,” Schwartz explained. His book, “The Algorithm Design Manual,” is used by people worldwide preparing for technical interviews. Knowing this book thoroughly is often a “suggested step” for people preparing to interview at Google or other tech companies, Schwartz added.
The students in Schwartz and Skiena’s labs share space and have regular weekly coffee hours. Schwartz appreciates how Skiena often “presents a puzzling question or an out-of-the-box take on a question.”
The core technical expertise at the institute is in machine learning, data science, computer vision and natural language processing.
The creation of the institute shows that Stony Brook is “serious about being one of the top universities and research centers for expertise in AI,” explained Schwartz.
A few years ago, researchers realized that the artificial intelligence models developed biases based on the kind of training data used to create them. “If you’re trying to build a system to judge resumes to decide who will be a good person to hire for a certain type of job” the system has a danger of searching for male candidates if most or all of the people hired had been male in the past, Skiena explained.
Unintentional biases can creep in if the data sets are skewed toward one group, even if the programmer who created the artificial intelligence system was using available information and patterns.
In his own research, Skiena, who has been at Stony Brook since 1988, works on natural language processing. Specifically, he has explored the meaning of words and what a text is trying to communicate.
He has worked on sentiment analysis, trying to understand questions such as whether a particular political figure who receives considerable media coverage is having a good or bad week.
Another project explores the quality of news sources. “Can you algorithmically analyze large corpuses of news articles and determine which are reliable and which are less so?” he asked.
One measure of the reliability of a news source is to determine how much other articles cite from it. “It is important to teach skepticism of a source” of news or of data, Skiena said.
“When I teach data science, a lot of what I teach includes questions of why you believe a model will do a good thing and why is a data source relevant,” he added.
A resident of Setauket, Skiena lives with his wife Renee. Their daughter Bonnie is a first-year student at the University of Delaware, where she is studying computer science. Their tenth-grade daughter Abby attends Ward Melville High School and joins her father for bike rides on Long Island.
Skiena, who grew up in East Brunswick, New Jersey, said he appreciates the university community. By working in the AI field, Skiena, who has seven doctoral students in his lab, said he often observes glitches in online models like article classification on Google News or advertisements selected for him on a website to try to figure out why the model erred. He has also developed a sense of how probability and random events work, which he said helps him not overinterpret unusual events in day-to-day life.
As for his work at the institute, Skiena hopes Stony Brook will be recognized as a major player in the field of machine learning and areas of artificial intelligence. “We have good faculty in this area already and we’re hiring more. The hope is that you reach critical mass.”
Mayor Margot Garant introduces Port Jefferson Village historian Chris Ryon
A visitor views the exhibit
Guest speakers Hank Janiesch, Rodger Schafer and Joe Ruggierio
Visitors view the exhibit
From left, historians Chris Ryon and John Hiz
It’s standing room only in the Sail Loft Room
From left, Joyce Philbin, Port Jefferson Mayor Margot Garant, Jeanne Garant and PJCC Director of Operations Barbara Ransome
Visitors view the exhibit
Entertainment for the evening was provided by Jazzopedia
Guest speakers, from left, Harold Sheprow, Vinny DeStefano, Cmdr. Jim Roth, Hank Janiesch, Rodger Schafer and Joe Ruggierio
From left, Olga Hargrove, Kathy Hauss, Linda Pape and Marion Abbott
From left, Ray Geminski; Jerry DiPierro; Sue Orifici; Sal Biamonte; Gay Gatta; and Ed Cartoski
6. From left, Cmdr. Jim Roth; President of Grumman Retirees Club, Betty Bohlander; and Joe Ruggierio
Photos from the Grumman exhibit
By Heidi Sutton
The Port Jefferson Conservancy hosted a reception for the Port Jefferson Village Center’s latest exhibit, GRUMMAN ON LONG ISLAND, A Photographic Tribute, on Jan. 10, an event that attracted over 250 visitors. Former Grumman employees, family, friends and the community came out to celebrate a reunion of sorts and to reminisce about the aerospace company that employed over 20,000 people on Long Island over the decades.
A highlight of the reception was a six-member guest panel that included Grummanites Vinny DeStefano, vice president of manufacturing; Hank Janiesch, vice president (F-14 Program); Rodger Schafer, technical adviser; Joe “Ruggs” Ruggerio, director of electronic warfare; Harold Sheprow, a flight test manager and former mayor of Port Jefferson; Jim Reynolds Sr., an ILS engineer; and Cmdr. Jim Roth, a combat pilot and aviation test pilot who was an instructor for the first Grumman A-6 Intruder squadron.
They took turns speaking about their experience at Grumman and then fielded questions from a standing room only audience. Each guest speaker echoed the same sentiment; that they had loved working for Grumman, were very proud of their career and would do it all over again.
The exhibit, which was curated by Port Jefferson historian Chris Ryon and the Village of Belle Terre historian John Hiz, boasts over 100 photos, several scale models of planes and a special test pilot section.
Mayor Margot Garant kicked off the reception, saying, “I want to recognize the outstanding work, the collaborate effort, of Chris Ryon and John Hiz. They have collectively put in at least 300 man-hours putting this exhibit together.”
“We had no idea what we were getting into a year ago when we decided to do a Grumman exhibit,’” said Ryon. “People have been coming into our office every day [to drop off photographs] and then we ended up going to the Grumman History Center and filling a 26-foot box truck [with more memorabilia]. It’s been great.”
“This [exhibit] is basically an idea of aphoto tribute to the Grumman Aerospace and Engineering Corporation between 1929 and 1994. That was the year they were acquired by Northrop,” said Hiz. “This evening we would like to reconnect through photographs, artifacts and mainly stories with individuals, families and friends who have contributed in making Grumman a household name on Long Island, a leader in aviation and space exploration and a very important part of our Long Island heritage.”
Visitors were treated to hors d’ouevres, wine and a special cake in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the moon landing.
The exhibit runs through February at the Port Jefferson Village Center, 101A East Main St., Port Jefferson. Admission is free. For further information, call 631-802-2160.
Informal tryouts for the multigenerational chorus, The Silver Chords, will take place at the Eugene Cannataro Senior Center, 420 Middle Country Road, Smithtown on Saturdays, Jan. 19 and 26. Join them to warm up during rehearsal at 9:30 a.m. An informal audition with the director will be held at noon. For more information, call Caroline at 631-235-3593 or Carl at 631-379-7066.
Prev
