UAlbany, IBM Announce New Artificial Intelligence Research Projects
ALBANY, N.Y. (Nov. 18, 2024) — The University at Albany and IBM Research on Monday announced seed funding for five new joint artificial intelligence (AI) research projects. These projects will explore the use of AI for designing complex circuits more efficiently, optimizing large language models for use in mental health applications, improving next-generation wireless signal processing, developing advanced mathematical applications and forecasting extreme weather in urban environments.
The projects are the first five funded through the Center for Emerging Artificial Intelligence Systems (CEAIS), a $20 million UAlbany-IBM research collaboration announced last year by Gov. Kathy Hochul that included the installation of state-of-the-art prototype IBM AI hardware at UAlbany.
With the founding of CEAIS, UAlbany became the first university in the world to receive a cluster of IBM Artificial Intelligence Unit (AIU) chips designed to support AI computing with greater speed and energy efficiency through lower-precision calculations. The projects funded will make use of the AIU cluster, containing prototype IBM Spyre chips, among other resources.
“CEAIS was conceived as a research incubator that would pair creative minds at UAlbany and IBM on innovative approaches to AI software, hardware and applications, while leveraging the latest technology coming out of the IBM Research AI Hardware Center in Albany,” said Thenkurussi (Kesh) Kesavadas, UAlbany's vice president for research and economic development. “I am so excited to see this first round of projects, in areas with tremendous social impact, take flight and eager to see the new knowledge and techniques that these explorations yield.”
“We applaud UAlbany for being at the forefront of AI research by supporting advances in both hardware and software technology,” said Mukesh Khare, general manager of IBM Semiconductors and vice president, Hybrid Cloud Research at IBM. “These new projects reveal how AI models could help solve some of today’s most pressing challenges, while running on state-of-the-art IBM Research prototype chips designed from the ground up for AI workloads.”
The five CEAIS projects funded for 2024 are:
- Leveraging AI for Advanced Extreme Weather Forecasting over New York City: Empire Innovation Professor Jorge Gonzalez-Gruz, Atmospheric Sciences Research Center
- Fine-tuning Large Language Models for Mental Health Applications: Assistant Professor Zi Yang, Department of Mathematics & Statistics, and Professor Xin Li, Department of Computer Science
- AI-Driven Power Converter Circuit Generation: Associate Professor Mohammed Agamy, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
- Mixed-Precision Deep Learning Models for Integrated Sensing and Communication: Associate Professor Dola Saha, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
- BayesianMamba: Probabilistic Perspective of Generalization of State Space Models: Assistant Professor Felix Ye, Department of Mathematics & Statistics
The projects announced Monday coincided with IBM Research’s 2024 AI Hardware Forum held at its Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Westchester County.
Separately, the State University of New York last month announced that four other UAlbany faculty members were among 14 systemwide to receive funding through the SUNY-IBM AI Research Alliance for projects to advance the efficiency and trustworthiness of AI systems.
Also last month, UAlbany unveiled its new AI supercomputer, which, along with the new IBM AIU cluster, is a centerpiece of the University’s AI Plus initiative to integrate teaching and learning about artificial intelligence across its academic and research programs.