Hot off the press from ACM this morning: ACM has named Judea Pearl of the University of California, Los Angeles the winner of the 2011 ACM A.M. Turing Award for innovations that enabled remarkable advances in the partnership between humans and machines that is the foundation of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Pearl pioneered developments in probabilistic and causal reasoning and their application to a broad range of problems and challenges. He created a computational foundation for processing information under uncertainty, a core problem faced by intelligent systems. He also developed graphical methods and symbolic calculus that enable machines to reason about actions and observations, and to assess cause-effect relationships from empirical findings. […]

As we noted in this space last month, the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) is holding workshops this spring to help young faculty prepare competitive CAREER proposals. Applications for the second workshop — to be held in Tempe, AZ, near the campus of Arizona State University — open today. The deadline to apply is April 23rd, with decisions to be returned within a couple days of that date. According to NSF and the workshop organizers: The workshop intends to provide young faculty members skills in CAREER proposal writing, panel review experience, and opportunities to interact with NSF program directors and recent NSF awardees. The major components of […]

On Feb. 16th, over 150 Federal officials, Congressional staffers, academic researchers, and industry leaders packed a room overlooking the United States Capitol to mark two decades of coordinated Federal investment in networking and information technology research and development with a daylong symposium exploring progress and prospects in the field. Today, I’m delighted to announce that we are launching a new website with complete materials from this extraordinary day — including videos, photos, slides, and written summaries from the 19 15-minute presentations by leaders of the field, plus a luncheon keynote by former Vice President Al Gore, a longtime champion of information technology R&D, and special remarks by former Congressman Tom […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) has issued a call for 2012 EERE Postdoctoral Research Awards, intended to provide recent Ph.D. recipients with opportunities to conduct research at universities, national laboratories, and other research facilities. This year’s program builds upon 14 inaugural awardees funded in 2011, and includes at least one research topic that requires a strong computer science or software background. The deadline to submit an award application is May 1, 2012. According to the EERE website: The objective of the EERE Postdoctoral Research Awards is to create the next generation of scientific leaders in energy efficiency and renewable energy by attracting the best scientists and engineers […]

As our colleagues at CRA’s Policy Blog have covered, Wired.com is out with an exclusive story this afternoon about Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Director Regina Dugan: Darpa director Regina Dugan will soon be stepping down from her position atop the Pentagon’s premiere research shop to take a job with Google. Dugan, whose controversial tenure at the agency lasted just under three years, was “offered and accepted at senior executive position” with the internet giant, according to Darpa spokesman Eric Mazzacone. She felt she couldn’t say no to such an “innovative company,” he adds.   Dugan’s emphasis on cybersecurity and next-generation manufacturing earned her strong support from the White House, winning her praise […]

The U.S. Department of State has unveiled the Tag Challenge, a “social gaming competition” in which participants will attempt to find five “suspects” as part of a simulated law enforcement search spanning five cities throughout North American and Europe on March 31st. The winning entrant — the first participant or team to successfully locate and photograph all five suspects — will receive a $5,000 cash prize. According to the contest website: Jewel thieves have stolen a prized diamond. Help find them. Win $5,000.   The infamous Panther Five has pulled an audacious new heist: they’ve stolen the world’s 3rd most expensive jewel, the Adly Diamond, from the Overholt Showroom in Washington, DC. […]