Earlier this month, the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE) released a new report — Rebuilding the Mosaic: Fostering Research in the Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences at the National Science Foundation in the Next Decade — representing the results of a year-long visioning process assessing the directorate’s existing research investments and identifying important research directions for the future. What’s interesting is that the report, which is based on 252 white paper submissions from 240 authors (received through an open submission process) specifically touts “an interdisciplinary, data-intensive, and collaborative vision for the future of SBE research” — one that necessitates new partnerships and synergies between social […]

The National Science Foundation (NSF) is out with a brief overview of the results of its annual Survey of Earned Doctorates (SED) for 2010, finding that the numbers of Ph.D.s in the computer sciences increased by 3.5 percent that year, more than in any other discipline. (The total number of doctorates awarded by U.S. academic institutions declined for the first time since 2002 — and NSF notes that reclassification of degrees and discontinuation of data collection in certain areas contributed at least in part to this drop.) According to the NSF InfoBrief:

The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) is out with a request for information (RFI) this month, seeking input on “a possible future IARPA investment (such as a program or grand challenge)” in automatic machine learning: Machine learning (ML) is used extensively in application areas of interest to IARPA including speech, language, vision, sensor processing, and multi-modal integration. Typically, expert practitioners in ML select appropriate architectures and algorithms for the application domain, performance requirements, and data characteristics of the problem at hand. Additionally, they engineer an appropriate set of features to be extracted from the data for use in the system design. Then, depending on the problem, data may be […]

Earlier today, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) released a new report — Trustworthy Cyberspace: Strategic Plan for the Federal Cybersecurity Research and Development Program — specifying an agenda for game-changing cybersecurity R&D. As U.S. CTO Aneesh Chopra and White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt noted in a blog post, the report provides “a roadmap to ensuring long-term reliability and trustworthiness of the digital communications network that is increasingly at the heart of American economic growth and global competitiveness.” In particular, the plan defines four strategic thrusts (after the jump):

Over 3,600 officials spanning government, industry, and academia are gathered at the third annual mHealth Summit just outside Washington, DC, this week, “to advance collaboration in the use of wireless technology to improve health outcomes in the U.S. and abroad.” Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius kicked off the conference on Monday morning, emphasizing the game-changing aspects of mobile health technology to improve clinical outcomes, promote preventative medicine, and reduce wasteful spending and healthcare costs. Sebelius noted that mobile healthcare technology is gaining added significance — and issued a call to arms to support innovation in mobile medical devices. “This is an incredible time to be having this […]

The third annual Computer Science Education Week — CSEdWeek for short — is just around the corner! Endorsed by Congress as December 4-10, 2011, in recognition of Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper’s birthday (Dec. 9th, 1906) and her many contributions to the field of computer science, CSEdWeek is “a call to action to raise awareness of computer science education and computing careers for students, educators, and the public.” There are numerous events and activities planned throughout the nation to illustrate how computer science education is essential to exposing students to critical thinking and problem solving; instilling an understanding of computational thinking for success in the digital era; and preparing students to […]