NSF awards $4.4 million to CS faculty

June 21, 2002 -- The Department of Computer Science has garnered seven awards from the National Science Foundation, totaling $4.4 million, with four of the awards funded through the NSF's Information Technology Research (ITR) program.

Congratulations to these faculty members:

• Keith Cooper, Devika Subramanian and Linda Torczon
  ITR: Building Practical Compilers Based on Adaptive Search, $1.6 million

• Peter Druschel
  Robust Large Scale Distributed Systems, $875,000

• Lydia Kavraki and Joe Warren
  ITR: Representations and Algorithms for Deformable Objects, $650,000

• Devika Subramanian and Richard Stoll(Political Science)
  ITR: Events, Patterns, and Analysis: Forecasting Conflict in the Twenty-First Century $400,000

• Scott Rixner and Vijay Pai
  Operating System and Architectural Implications of Programmable Network Interfaces, $303,000

• David B. Johnson
  Security in Multihop Wireless Ad Hoc Network Routing, $300,000

• Ron Goldman
  Systematic Construction of Single Determinants Representing Sparse Resultants, $255,000

Through the ITR program that was initiated in 2000, the NSF seeks innovative projects in research and education that elucidate, expand and exploit information technology. In a 1999 report, the President's Information Technology Advisory Committee , for which Ken Kennedy served as co-chair, stated that the U.S. was "gravely underinvesting" in information technology research. Without new funding for "long-term, high-risk research," the committee said, America's preeminence in information technology would be threatened. In response, the NSF and other federal research agencies have worked via the National Science and Technology Council to develop research programs.

The NSF is supporting fundamental research into "key technologies" that PITAC's report encouraged: advanced computers for simulation of physical phenomena; technology for collaboration between remote researchers; tools for graphic visualization of complex data; and software for managing very large databases.