Center for Data Science Holds Research Symposium

The Center for Data Science held its fourth annual Data Science Research Symposium on Wednesday, April 24, to support collaboration with industry partners and drive economic development in the Commonwealth and elsewhere.

The event, held in the Campus Center, connected faculty members, researchers and students with industry and public sector leaders to explore practical applications of data science and the potential of its research.

Companies such as Amazon, Bloomberg, Bose, C&S Wholesale Grocers, Fitbit, GE Healthcare, IBM, MassMutual, Microsoft, Optum, Oracle, Pratt & Whitney, Raytheon, Stanley Black and Decker, State Street, Voya Financial, and Wayfair attended.

Speakers described recent advances in autonomous vehicles, disease trajectory modeling, pandemic disease forecasting, computer vision, natural language processing, and virtual reality/augmented reality, and also share perspectives on future university-grade data science research challenges.

Andrew McCallum, director of the center and distinguished professor of computer science in the College of Information and Computer Sciences, says this year’s symposium showcased the center’s growing portfolio of industry-sponsored data science research, and examine technical trends and future opportunities in this rapidly-growing field.

“We’re excited by the high level of interest the Symposium has attracted, each year bigger than the last," said McCallum. “The conversations and connections made this year will be the foundation for transformational new partnerships in the years to come.”