Amazon and the College of Washington (UW) have collaborated for many years, starting from studying alternatives for college kids to assist for school and capital assist. In 2022, Amazon and UW based the UW-Amazon Science Hub.
The Science Hub immediately introduced the second cohort of Amazon Fellows. Fellowships are awarded yearly to PhD college students enrolled within the UW School of Engineering, with the scholars receiving funding to pursue impartial analysis tasks in robotics and adjoining areas in AI. The awardees are
Taewan Kim, left, is a third-year PhD scholar within the William E. Boeing Division of Aeronautics & Astronautics. Chuning Zhu, proper, is a PhD scholar and member of the Washington Embodied Intelligence and Robotics Growth (WEIRD) lab.
Taewan Kim, a third-year PhD scholar within the William E. Boeing Division of Aeronautics & Astronautics, suggested by Behçet Açikmeşe, professor of aerospace optimization and management and adjunct professor {of electrical} and pc engineering. Kim’s present analysis lies on the intersection of management principle, optimization, and machine studying, the place he focuses on creating a closed-loop framework leveraging each management and studying principle to ensure security and stability for robots working in unsure environments.
Chuning Zhu, a PhD scholar and member of the Washington Embodied Intelligence and Robotics Growth (WEIRD) lab, suggested by Abhishek Gupta, an assistant professor within the Paul G. Allen Faculty of Laptop Science & Engineering. Zhu makes use of deep reinforcement studying to construct robots that autonomously purchase notion and manipulation abilities by interacting with the bodily world.
The UW-Amazon Science Hub immediately has additionally awarded present analysis funding to 5 UW professors. Every present funds a year-long mission addressing a cutting-edge problem within the subject of robotics and AI innovation. Under are this yr’s recipients and their analysis tasks, which have been reviewed by the UW Advisory Group and Amazon:
From left to proper, Ashis G. Banerjee, affiliate professor, Industrial & Techniques Engineering and Mechanical Engineering; Mehmet Kurt, assistant professor, Mechanical Engineering; Nadya Peek, assistant professor, Human Centered Design & Engineering; Lillian Ratliff, affiliate professor, Electrical & Laptop Engineering; and Simon Shaolei Du, assistant professor, Laptop Science & Engineering.
Ashis G. Banerjee, affiliate professor, Industrial & Techniques Engineering and Mechanical Engineering: “Decentralized visible mapping of cluttered scenes utilizing a group of low-cost cellular robots”
Mehmet Kurt, director of Kurtlab and assistant professor, Mechanical Engineering: “Harm stage evaluation in packages by transformer-based neural networks and sensitivity evaluation”
Nadya Peek, assistant professor, Human Centered Design & Engineering: “Robotic pack-a-thon: Packing arbitrary objects with fabricatable flexural manipulators”
Lillian Ratliff, affiliate professor, Electrical & Laptop Engineering, and adjunct affiliate professor, Paul G. Allen Faculty of Laptop Science & Engineering and Aeronautics & Astronautics: “Hierarchical framework for scalable multi-agent autonomous mobility”
Simon Shaolei Du, assistant professor, Paul G. Allen Faculty of Laptop Science & Engineering: “Theoretically principled illustration studying for multi-task reinforcement studying”
“I’m delighted by how the Science Hub has supplied a automobile to broaden and deepen the long-standing collaboration between UW and Amazon,” mentioned UW president Ana Mari Cauce. “That collaboration continues to develop as we make progress towards fixing basic issues in science and engineering for the advantage of individuals and communities in Washington and past, which aligns completely with UW’s public mission.”
“With the launch of the Amazon College Hubs program in 2020, we charted a course that will broaden entry to rising applied sciences by strengthening partnerships throughout academia and business and supply demonstrable worth to all constituents,” mentioned Anu Datta, director of Strategic Recruiting and Tutorial Partnerships, Amazon. “We’re delighted by the momentum we’ve been capable of generate along with UW in attaining this purpose and look ahead to seeing how the newest analysis tasks and college awards assist to unravel advanced, real-world issues.”
Amazon joins UW’s FOCI
On the launch of the Science Hub, Amazon and UW outlined how the scope of the collaboration would increase over time to signify extra analysis matter areas, with funding to assist a broad set of packages.
As a part of the continuing collaboration, Amazon has joined the UW Middle for the Way forward for Cloud Infrastructure (FOCI). Established in October 2022 and housed inside the Paul G. Allen Faculty of Laptop Science & Engineering, FOCI goals to foster a decent partnership between practitioners and researchers to outline the following era of cloud infrastructure. The middle will domesticate stronger connections between academia and business to allow cloud-based techniques to succeed in new heights in safety, reliability, efficiency, and sustainability.
Amazon will be part of the technical advisory board that informs and guides the middle’s analysis towards real-world influence primarily based on present tendencies, what issues they anticipate over a 5- to 10-year time horizon, and the way options could be utilized in observe.
“For almost twenty years, Amazon and UW have been on the epicenter of cloud computing innovation,” mentioned Arvind Krishnamurthy, FOCI codirector and the Brief-Dooley Professor within the Allen Faculty. “Our evolving partnership will proceed to leverage UW’s management in foundational pc techniques analysis and Amazon’s experience in constructing and deploying real-world purposes on a world scale to outline cloud computing for the following few a long time.”
“Amazon Internet Providers has been on the forefront of cloud computing since 2006, and has frequently accelerated innovation in {hardware} and software program to assist just about any workload and distinctive buyer use case,” mentioned Rahul Pathak, vp, Relational Database Engines, AWS. “With the potential of latest, fast-moving applied sciences like generative AI, issues will proceed to alter quickly for academia, business, and prospects alike. We’re happy to affix FOCI and additional collaborate with UW to assist speed up analysis and its purposes into the following era of cloud infrastructure and databases, analytics, and ML techniques.”
