CYBERSECURITY CENTER:

A university computer science professor has been named director of the Maryland Cybersecurity Center, a prominent institute focused on cybersecurity research and education.

Jonathan Katz, an expert in cryptography and information security, has been working at this university since 2002, and has also worked as a consultant for the federal government, as well as private companies.

The center, which launched in 2010, promotes collaboration in technology development and research between the university and corporations like Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, among others.

“I look forward to working with our students, faculty and external partners to help prepare the future cybersecurity workforce and to develop new technologies to defend against cyberattacks,” Katz told UMD Right Now.

ALUM HONORED:

A university alumnus who designed technology to aid U.S. naval defense will be inducted into the engineering school’s Innovation Hall of Fame.

Jerry Krill, who received a doctorate degree from the engineering school in 1978, helped develop the Cooperative Engagement Capability, a data-sharing network that helps Navy battle groups act cohesively by providing them with a shared operating picture.

Krill oversaw the development of this concept beginning in 1974, and played a major role in its execution for several decades. Senior Navy officials have called the network “one of the Navy’s crown jewels,” according to UMD Right Now.

BOOK DEAL:

Rebecca Martinson, a former member of this university’s Delta Gamma chapter, whose email to her sorority members went viral earlier this year, has received a book deal, The Baltimore Sun reported.

Martinson will team up with the creators of the “White Girl Problems” Twitter account to write a novel on an unknown subject, according to The Sun.

Since resigning from the sorority after Delta Gamma representatives described the email as “highly inappropriate and unacceptable by any standard,” Martinson has been writing for the website Bro Bible, and her Twitter account has garnered more than 10,000 followers, The Sun reported.