Communications’ Digital Initiative and Its First Digital Event

As Editor-in-Chief, it is my pleasure to introduce a new program: Communications’ digital initiative that connects leading-edge research and technology insights and breakthroughs from ACM’s conferences to a much larger audience. The idea is to select compelling topics of broad interest and highlight them in a vibrant conversation with key leaders in an interactive digital event—one you can participate with live or view later via the ACM Digital Library.

We held our first digital initiative in February. Below are some details about the event and link to watch it.

Andrew A. Chien, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Science February 1, 2022 Watch: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3517329

Communications’ first Digital Event was an exciting discussion with AI research leaders from academia and industry who explored how science and AI are transforming each other. The program kicked off with an in-depth presentation by Anima Anandkumar, Caltech Professor and Director of ML Research (NVIDIA), and recent Gordon Bell finalist. Anandkumar discussed how machine learning is growing in capability to solve science problems. She also noted some exciting recent outcomes.

Figure. Panelists (from left): Amina Anandkumar, Vikram Adve, Amy McGovern, and Jess Thaler.

The other panelists (noted below) lead NSF-funded AI institutes and shared how their teams are attacking a broad array of fundamental problems as AI meets science.

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Panelists

• Anima Anandkumar, Bren Professor (Caltech), and Director of ML Research (NVIDIA)
• Vikram Adve: Donald B. Gillies Professor of Computer Science, Director AIFARMS National AI Institute
• Amy McGovern: Lloyd G. and Joyce Austin Presidential Professor, School of Computer Science and School of Meteorology; Director, NSF AI Institute for Research on Trustworthy AI in Weather, Climate, and Coastal Oceanography; University of Oklahoma
• Jesse Thaler: Professor of Physics at MIT, Director at NSF AI Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Fundamental Interactions

Our panelists described the key technical challenges and breakthrough opportunities at their AI institutes. Following short presentations, Andrew A. Chien, Editor-in-Chief of Communications, led a lively discussion with the panelists and took questions from the live audience.

Host: Andrew A. Chien, Editor-in-Chief of Communications, William Eckhardt Professor, University of Chicago and Senior Scientist, Argonne National Laboratory.

Organizer: Morgan Denlow, Deputy to the Editor-in-Chief