College of Engineering News
Dr. Kwan-Liu Ma receives inaugural HP award to underwrite interactive visualization techniques
A Game-Changing Performance
Posted on: August 20, 2008
Dr. Kwan-Liu Ma is a game-changer, according to Hewlett-Packard. His research into "Visual Analytics Tools for Enterprise Information Management" was recently recognized with a 2008 Innovation Research Award from HP Labs, the company's central research arm. This international competition - dubbed "the Olympics of research" by Prith Banerjee, director of HP Labs and senior vice president for research - was launched to promote innovation through collaborative research between industry and academia.
The Best and the Brightest
HP selected 41 professors from 14 countries doing research projects at 34 of the world's top technical universities to receive these inaugural awards.
"Around the world, HP partners with the best and the brightest in industry and academia to drive open innovation and set the agenda for breakthrough technologies that are designed to change the world," explained Banerjee. "HP Labs' selection of UC Davis for a 2008 Innovation Award demonstrates outstanding achievement and will help accelerate HP Labs' global research agenda in pursuit of scientific breakthroughs."
Industry-Relevant Research
Awardees like Professor Ma will be funded to investigate some of the world's most relevant business and technological challenges. HP anticipates their work will lead to innovative solutions in the areas of information explosion, dynamic cloud services, content transformation, intelligent infrastructure and sustainability.
Information Management
Information is the engine driving today's enterprise. Managing that information is critical to the success of the modern organization. Providing the next generation of information management and knowledge discovery tools is the critical challenge facing the world. Professor Ma proposes to help solve this pressing problem by developing "interactive visualization techniques that can help manage and make sense of large unstructured, heterogeneous, and multidimensional data."
Professor Ma received an award of $50,000 for the first year, which will support his research and the work of one post-doctoral candidate. The award can be renewed for a total of three years based on research results.
With this award and recognition, Professor Ma continues to support the College of Engineering's visionary plan to meet the information technology challenges of today and the next 50 years through innovative research, quality education, interdisciplinary collaboration, and strategic growth.
The next request for proposals is planned for spring 2009.
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