|
Duke Professor Wins $1 Million Artificial Intelligence Prize, A ‘New Nobel’
Whether preventing explosions on electrical grids, spotting patterns among past crimes, or optimizing resources in the care of critically ill patients, Duke University computer scientist and engineer Cynthia Rudin wants artificial intelligence (AI) to show its work. While many scholars in the developing field of machine learning were focused on improving algorithms, Rudin instead wanted to use AI’s power to help society.
Now, after 15 years of advocating for and developing “interpretable” machine learning algorithms that allow humans to see inside AI, Rudin’s contributions to the field have earned her the $1 million Squirrel AI Award for Artificial Intelligence for the Benefit of Humanity from the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI).
| |
| Gift to Duke Law Endows New Post-Graduate Public Interest FellowshipA $500,000 gift from alumnus James Farrin ’90 and his wife, Robin, will establish a new fellowship for Duke Law School students to do public interest legal work after graduation.
The Farrin Fellowship will provide salary and benefits, including health insurance and paid time off, for a graduating student to work for a year with a 501(c)(3) organization that provides domestic legal services. Preference will be given to graduates working on behalf of low-income or indigent clients, particularly individuals or groups who have historically faced discrimination, as well as graduates serving clients in the Carolinas.
| |
|
Center for Documentary Studies Announces New DirectorMedia innovation executive Opeyemi Olukemi is the new director of the Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) at Duke University. Olukemi, the fourth director in the center’s 32-year history, began work in September. She came to Duke after stints at the Tribeca Film Institute and, most recently, American Documentary | POV, where she initiated partnerships, initiatives, and projects at the intersections of technology and storytelling.
“The overlapping crises facing humanity create an interesting challenge and opportunity for the arts. The Center for Documentary Studies is uniquely positioned to lead not just in nonfiction media creation, but in determining the power of documentary and its impact on our culture, and in critiquing, challenging, and altering the systemic forces that bind us.”
- - Opeyemi Olukemi, Incoming Director, Center for Documentary Studies
| |
|
Duke Co-Sponsors National Summit on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher EducationOn October 12 and 13, Duke University and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) co-hosted the 2021 Public Summit of the NASEM Action Collaborative on Preventing Sexual Harassment in Higher Education. President Price and Provost Kornbluth gave opening and closing remarks, and several Duke faculty, staff and graduate students gave presentations.
| |
| Hear from Duke experts...
| |
| The CFO Survey: Cost Pressures Mount Amid Widespread Supply Disruption and Labor Shortages
Three-fourths of U.S. CFOs express difficulty hiring, leading them to increase wages, according to The CFO Survey. Most CFOs also indicate in the third-quarter survey that their firms are experiencing supply chain disruptions that are expected to last well into 2022. When asked whether they are currently experiencing disruptions in their supply chains, three-quarters of firms report disruptions, including production delays, shipping delays, reduced availability of materials, and increased materials prices.
“ The actions that these companies are taking to manage supply chain disruptions are costly and hence increase the pressure on companies to increase prices.”
- - John Graham, director for The CFO Survey
The CFO Survey is a collaboration of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business and the Federal Reserve Banks of Richmond and Atlanta.
| |
| Smuggling Light Through Opaque Materials
Electrical engineers at Duke University have discovered that changing the physical shape of a class of materials commonly used in electronics and near- and mid-infrared photonics—chalcogenide glasses—can extend their use into the visible and ultraviolet parts of the electromagnetic spectrum. Already commercially used in detectors, lenses and optical fibers, chalcogenide glasses may now find a home in applications such as underwater communications, environmental monitoring and biological imaging.
This research was supported by the Office of Naval Research, Army Research Laboratory Cooperative Agreement, and National Science Foundation (NSF).
| |
| Brand Praise: When Coke Compliments Pepsi
Whether they’re beefing on billboards or sparring on social media, big brands are known for taking jabs at their competitors (see the famous “Get a Mac” ads or “the chicken sandwich wars”).
What consumer brands typically do not do is compliment those rivals – they wouldn’t want to grant an adversary free publicity, said Keisha Cutright, a marketing professor at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. But new research from Cutright published in the Journal of Marketing suggests a little goodwill can pay off.
| |
|
|
|
|