In May, The White House Office of Science Technology Policy, Department of Commerce and the Arnold Foundation approached the Computing Community Consortium (CCC), as a community organization of computer science researchers, to lead a conversation for law enforcement to learn about the state of the art in video analysis techniques and how they may be applicable to analyze and improve law enforcement practice. This was a timely opportunity to provide input to a burgeoning application space: police body worn cameras. The CCC brought together a panel of computer vision experts and law enforcement personnel. Their subsequent discussions resulted in the recently released Video Analysis for Body-worn Cameras in Law Enforcement whitepaper. The whitepaper […]

President Obama has issued an Executive Order establishing the National Strategic Computing Initiative (NSCI), which is an effort to create a cohesive, multi-agency strategic vision, and Federal investment strategy in high-performance computing (HPC). HPC systems, through their high levels of computing power and large amounts of storage capacity, are essential to economic competitiveness, scientific discovery, and national security. The NSCI will ensure that the United States continues leading in this field over the coming decades. As the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology has concluded, high-performance computing “must now assume a broader meaning, encompassing not only flops, but also the ability, for example, to efficiently manipulate vast and rapidly increasing […]

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Big Data to Knowledge initiative (BD2K) has announced the release of an Request for Applications (RFA) for software and methods development in biomedical big data science: “Big Data to Knowledge (BD2K) Development of Software Tools and Methods for Biomedical Big Data in Targeted Areas of High Need (U01)“. This opportunity targets three topic areas of high need for researchers working with biomedical Big Data: Data privacy is one of the fundamental challenges of our age. To take full advantage of the power of big data to drive biomedical discovery, researchers must work with data from disparate sources and with differing privacy policies and protections. How do we integrate […]

The last President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) meeting was held on Tuesday, July 14th at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC. The presentations as well as the webcast videos have all been posted. You can see the full agenda here. Charles Bolden and William Gerstenmaier, Administrator and Associate Administrator, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Garrett Reisman, Director of Crew Operations, SpaceX John Elbon, Vice President and General Manager, Space Exploration, The Boeing Company Gregory Hager, Professor and Former Chair of Computer Science, Johns Hopkins University Seth Sternberg, CEO and Co-Founder, Honor Kai Stinchombe, Founder and CEO, True Link Financial For more information, please see the past […]

The next public President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) meeting will be this Tuesday, July 14, 2015 from 9:00 AM -12:00 PM ET at the National Academy of Sciences, 2101 Constitution Avenue, NW, Washington, DC. Online registration for the meeting is now OPEN. While registration is not required to attend this meeting, seating is limited, and preference will be given to those who registered in advance online.  The meeting will also be webcast. This meeting is particularly important for the computer science community, as it includes the Review of the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) program.  This presentation will be led by Eric Schmidt and J. […]

The 2015 Microsoft Research Faculty Summit will be streamed live from Redmond, Washington on Wednesday, July 8 and Thursday, July 9. This free online event offers keynotes and selected presentations from the Faculty Summit on future trends in computer science research. This year’s event, which focuses on Artificial Intelligence, includes former Computing Community Consortium (CCC) Council Member and now Microsoft Research Managing Director, Eric Horvitz. Eric recently posted a CCC blog post on the Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence. The Summit will feature three keynote speakers and a panel: July 8: Opening Keynote 8:30–9:15 A.M. PT (11:30 A.M.–12:15 P.M. ET): Jeannette Wing, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Research Panel: Progress in AI: Myths, Realities […]