Aaron Gokaslan, a prominent researcher and PhD student from Cornell Tech, has received the PyTorch Award for 2023. PyTorch’s codebase is a popular deep-learning framework, and the PyTorch Award for Excellence in Code Review is a recognition of Gokaslan’s dedication to maintaining the highest standards in AI technology.
“I am deeply honored to contribute to the PyTorch community and receive the PyTorch Award for Excellence in Code Review. Code review is a vital part of maintaining the quality and reliability of open-source software,” says Gokaslan. “This award reflects the collective efforts of the entire PyTorch community, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with such dedicated and talented individuals. I look forward to continuing to ensure that PyTorch remains a trusted and robust platform for AI research and development.”
Gokaslan currently works with Volodymyr Kuleshov, Assistant Professor at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech and in the Computer Science Department at Cornell University, and is presently researching open and efficient generative models, specifically looking at how to bring the cost down of training and deploying. He also continues to work on using large language models on DNA sequences and biological data for science, drug discovery, and gene editing.
“The award presented by the PyTorch Foundation is a testament to Aaron’s contributions to the world of machine learning,” says Kuleshov. “Aaron has a significant impact on the PyTorch community, particularly in code review, which plays a critical role in advancing the field of artificial intelligence. His work and research are vital to the growth and strengthening of A.I. infrastructure.”
Angelique Taylor, Assistant Professor at Cornell Tech and the Information Science Department at Cornell UniversityAngelique Taylor, Assistant Professor at Cornell Tech and the Information Science Department at Cornell University, has earned the Google Inclusion Research Award for her work in robotics and healthcare. The award recognizes her recent proposed research, “Towards Robots for Inclusive Clinical Teamwork: Empowering Nurses to Promote Patient Safety.”
The Google Inclusion Research Award acknowledges individuals who research computing and technology and are dedicated to addressing the needs of marginalized groups and creating a more inclusive and equitable tech ecosystem. This award will allow Taylor to further her research and continue to work on providing safer healthcare practices.
“We must continue to bridge the gap between cutting-edge research, technology, and patient care to create a healthcare system that serves everyone. I am excited to continue this research with the support of Google and receive the Google Award for Inclusion Research,” says Taylor.
In an ever-changing healthcare landscape, Taylor’s research has pushed her students and healthcare professionals to explore original and unexpected solutions. Receiving the Google Inclusion Research Award recognizes her outstanding contributions and advocates her vision of making healthcare more efficient and patient-centered.
“Pilot: New York City” Includes Recommendations to Boost Innovation Opportunities and Technology Piloting Across NYC
Roadmap Builds on a Long-standing Collaboration between Cornell Tech and NYCEDC and Proposes Measures Including Technology Procurement Modernization
Cornell Tech and the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) announced the launch of Pilot: New York City to advance New York City as a global hub for urban innovation. The new initiative, a key proposal within the “New” New York Panel Making New York Work for Everyone Action Plan, aims to streamline processes, collaborate with the private sector, nonprofits, and academia, and tap into the creativity of New Yorkers, to enable the city to become one of the world’s most important places to pilot and scale urban innovation ranging from curbside electric vehicle charging to building decarbonization technology.
Cara Eckholm, Fellow at the Urban Tech Hub of the Jacobs Institute and lead author of the report
Together with the Urban Tech Hub of the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech, NYCEDC undertook a nine-month research collaboration to create Pilot: New York City. Cara Eckholm, an Urban Tech Fellow, served on the “New” New York advisory panel and was the lead author of the report. The research involved interviews with over 120 stakeholders, including government agencies, tech companies, accelerators and incubators, academics, and financiers. New York City’s experience was then compared with best practices in other cities.
As a result, three overall themes lay the foundation for implementing Pilot: New York City:
First, the City should bolster its own innovation capacity through supporting innovation personnel at agencies and initiating more direct collaboration with local universities to ensure that promising pilots transition to procurement orders and policy changes.
Second, the City should pursue procurement modernization by codifying a “challenge-based” procurement method, allowing agencies to define the problem they are trying to solve and test different technology solutions in the real world on the path to making a final purchase decision.
Third, the City should enhance its support infrastructure for urban innovation startups through convening a pilot network—a group of accelerators and dedicated pilot sites—that together offer a streamlined point-of-entry for startups launching and growing in New York City.
“New York has long been the hub of urban innovation, dating back to the 1880s, when Edison electrified a one-mile radius off Pearl Street. We are researching how to encourage more Edison-style ‘bottom-up’ innovation, but also how we can spur ‘top down’ innovation through government programs. For startups, New York is a market-maker—and the City can use its procurement power to drive the development of new technology,” said Cara Eckholm, Fellow at the Urban Tech Hub of the Jacobs Institute and lead author of the report.
“As cities and technology continue to converge, cities need new tools, products and policies to adapt to an increasingly data-driven world,” said Michael Samuelian, Founding Director of the Urban Tech Hub of the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech. “Pilot: New York City is an important example of how novel partnerships between academia and local governments can help power the innovation of New York’s incredible tech ecosystem, and help make the City the global center of urban innovation.”
“New York City is the second largest startup ecosystem in the world,” said NYCEDC President & CEO Andrew Kimball. “Pilot: New York City furthers our partnership with Cornell Tech to accelerate urban innovation to make it easier for entrepreneurs and companies to do business with the City.”
Pilot: New York City will seek to streamline coordination and collaboration across public, private, academic and nonprofit partners to accelerate urban innovation. The initiative creates a first-of-its-kind roadmap that will set New York City on its course to becoming the leading ecosystem for urban tech companies to build, grow and scale their businesses and strengthen the city’s capacity to address both climate change and economic recovery, while growing and diversifying New York’s economy. For any questions about the report, please reach out to cara.eckholm@cornell.edu.
The Urban Tech Hub is an academic center that generates applied research, fosters an expanding tech ecosystem, and cultivates a new generation of urban technology talent. It brings a human-centered approach to research and education with the aim of building a better world through increased access and opportunity within the technology sector. Urban Tech Fellows, are expected to generate innovative research and insights aligned with specific urban tech domains, such as mobility, infrastructure, climate change, housing, etc. Their research serves as a catalyst for improving urban living now or in the future. Applications for the upcoming round of Urban Tech Fellows are currently open, with a deadline set for December 1st, 2023.
Cornell Tech has announced a total of more than $10 million in gifts and grants from the Simons Foundation and the National Science Foundation, respectively, to support arXiv, a free distribution service and open-access archive for scholarly articles.
The funding will allow the growing repository with more than 2 million articles to migrate to the cloud and modernize its code to ensure reliability, fault tolerance and accessibility for researchers.
“I am deeply grateful for this tremendous support from both the Simons Foundation and the NSF,” said Greg Morrisett, the Jack and Rilla Neafsey Dean and Vice Provost of Cornell Tech. “This investment ensures that the arXiv service will continue to scale, to serve an even broader constituency, and better serve the arXiv scientific community.”
“This generous funding from the Simons Foundation and the National Science Foundation will allow arXiv to expand its critical growth in the scientific community, where it allows thousands of researchers to freely disseminate, exchange and explore their findings,” said Ramin Zabih, arXiv faculty director and professor of computer science at Cornell Tech. “By modernizing the code base and transitioning to the cloud, we are strengthening arXiv’s infrastructure and ensuring that it will continue to be a source of innovation in the sharing of scholarly publications. We are grateful to the Simons Foundation and the NSF for their support and for sharing in our vision for arXiv.”
The next stage of arXiv’s development will include hiring multiple software developers to support the modernization effort. In parallel, faculty members in the Department of Computer Science, with funding provided by the NSF grant 2311521, will develop new search and recommendation techniques that can be tested and deployed on arXiv’s large and active user community, supported by state of the art privacy guarantees. In addition, arXiv will provide substantially better access to the visually impaired by producing HTML as well as PDF versions of its content.
“The arXiv has been a critical piece of research infrastructure for decades, and just as important, part of the foundation of open science that the world relies on every day,” said David Spergel, president of the Simons Foundation. “Through our partner Cornell Tech, the foundation is proud to continue its investment in arXiv. This gift will help modernize the arXiv and ensure its sustainability for the community of scientists and mathematicians whose contributions have made it what it is.”
arXiv was founded in 1991 by then-Los Alamos National Laboratory physicist Paul Ginsparg, Ph.D. ’81, prior to his return to Cornell in 2001. The repository is now maintained and operated by Cornell Tech, and serves researchers in the fields of physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative biology, quantitative finance, statistics, electrical engineering and systems science, and economics.
“The Simons Foundation has provided essential behind-the-scenes support for arXiv since 2011, as a natural partner in support of the research enterprise,” said Ginsparg, professor of physics in the College of Arts and Sciences, and of information science in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science. “The additional support to facilitate a transition to long-term sustainability should permit arXiv to enhance through an even longer period the transformative effects it has had on research communication over the past three decades.”
In addition to the Simons Foundation’s ongoing support, arXiv is supported by academic and research libraries, universities, research organizations, professional societies and individual donors.
Helen Nissenbaum, Andrew H. and Ann R. Tisch Professor
Helen Nissenbaum, Professor at Cornell Tech, member of the Information Science Department at Cornell University and Director of the Digital Life Initiative, has been named the Andrew H. and Ann R. Tisch Professor at Cornell Tech. Nissenbaum began her tenure as an endowed chair effective July 1st.
“Even as advances in AI and powerful surveillance technologies hold promise for humanity, they pose enormous threats. Through fundamental research and practical interventions, I have had the good fortune of working with outstanding members of the DLI community and Cornell Tech colleagues, to preserve and promote ethical values, quality of life for all, and human dignity. Being named the Andrew H. and Ann R. Tisch Professor brings honor and recognition to this ongoing work.” said Nissenbaum.
As the Director of the Digital Life Initiative, Nissenbaum oversees the exploration of societal perspectives surrounding the development and application of digital technology, focusing on ethics, policy, politics, and quality of life.
Nissenbaum holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from Stanford University and a B.A. (Hons) in philosophy and mathematics from the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa.
The Andrew H. and Ann R. Tisch Chaired Professorship at Cornell Tech was endowed by the couple in 2016.
