With support from the National Science Foundation, the Computing Community Consortium (CCC) today named 20 talented recent Ph.D.s in computer science and allied fields 2011 Computing Innovation Fellows (CIFellows). These exceptionally talented researchers — from 18 different Ph.D.-granting colleges and universities — are beginning one- to two-year postdoctoral positions at 17 academic and industrial research institutions nationwide. They join a total of 107 others who have been supported through the CIFellows Project since 2009, as part of a short-term effort to forestall a permanent loss of research talent due to the financial crisis and subsequent economic downturn. The 2011 CIFellows were competitively selected from 177 applicants spanning 76 Ph.D.-granting colleges and […]

Congratulations to Miriah Meyer, one of our 2009 Computing Innovation Fellows — and now faculty at the University of Utah’s School of Computing — who was just named to the Technology Review‘s annual list of 35 Innovators Under 35! Here’s the TR35 write-up for Miriah: Biological research is exploding with genomic, molecular, and chemical data. But analyzing all that information has been difficult and slow, in part because biologists haven’t had good ways to visualize the data — to see it represented graphically on screen so as to help them spot trends and make comparisons. University of Utah computer science professor Miriah Meyer is addressing that problem by developing programs […]

A few weeks ago, we began highlighting a few of the 107 Computing Innovation Fellows (CIFellows) we’ve had the pleasure of funding. (With support from the NSF, the CIFellows Project was established two years ago to provide recent Ph.D.s in computer science and allied fields exciting one- to two-year opportunities at universities and industrial research labs. A key goal was to retain these bright young graduates in research and teaching during the economic downturn. A total of 60 CIFellows were funded in 2009, followed by 47 others in 2010.) The CIFellows listed below — again, they’re in no particular order — are pursuing groundbreaking computing research in areas like learning, biology, sustainability, and […]

We’re still in the midst of reviewing applications for the 2011-12 Computing Innovation Fellows Project, but I thought I would take a moment today to begin highlighting the stories of our current and former CIFellows. The CIFellows Project was always intended to provide recent Ph.D.s in computer science (and allied fields) with short-term postdoctoral positions in academia and industry, to keep them in research and teaching despite the economic downturn. In the past two years, we’ve heard great things about the CIFellows, the CIFellow-mentor relationships, the research results borne out of the program, and, most importantly, the outcomes for many of the CIFellows in terms of the permanent opportunities that […]

The following is a special contribution to this blog by Cindy L. Bethel, a 2009 Computing Innovation Fellow (CIFellow) working with Brian Scassellati in the Social Robotics Laboratory at Yale University. Cindy received her Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of South Florida in 2009 under the direction of co-advisors Robin Murphy and Larry Hall. Her research focuses on the areas of human-robot interaction and social robotics. Click here for more information about Cindy, or here for more details about the CIFellows Project. Entering the workforce following the support and protection of graduate school can be challenging. These challenges were compounded by a difficult economy with limited […]

A final reminder that the deadline for applications to the 2011-12 Computing Innovation Fellows (CIFellows) Project is 5pm EDT next Tuesday, May 31. Graduates awarded the Ph.D. or equivalent in computing or allied fields from U.S. institutions between May 1, 2010, and Aug. 31, 2011, are eligible to apply. All application materials — including confidential letters of recommendation to be provided separately by the letter writers — must be submitted through the CIFellows Project website by the deadline. The full announcement appears below. A few common questions thus far: To help meet the deadline, applicants may provide names of recommenders prior to submitting an application; CRA/CCC will contact the recommenders while the applicants are gathering […]