2023-2024, Year 2

Progress

This year, the AICoE’s goal was to expand our outreach across UD and build relationships with local industries and institutions through hackathons, seed funding, grant submissions and invited talks. In July 2023, AICoE teamed up with UD’s Data Science Institute to host the 3 day DS+AI Hackathon, where 70 UD students and 4 industry mentors utilized AI and Data Science methods to solve case studies across health, chemistry, and hydrogen fuel topics. Of 11 teams participating, 4 teams won in the categories of: Creativity and Originality, Remarkable Impact, Technical Complexity and Problem Statement Execution.

In fall 2023, the center released the 2nd call for seed funding to UD for researchers who leverage machine learning and AI. 13 LOIs were submitted from 9 different departments across 4 colleges. 10 submissions were invited to submit proposals, and 7 awards were announced in Jan 2024. Awarded PIs were from a variety of departments, including: Computer and Information Sciences, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Composite Materials, Geography and Spatial Sciences, and Materials Science. As of now, AICoE seed funded projects have collectively received over $800,000 in external funding from DOD, Rally Foundation and General University Research Program. Also, there are external proposals totalling $20,000,000 under review by NSF, NIH, ARPA and Army Corp.

Co-Director Sunita Chandrasekaran submitted an NSF SCIPE in Jan 2024 proposal for $4.7 million, which was awarded in Summer 2024. The award aims to build a Research Software Engineer (RSE) workforce and pipeline at UD to help researchers with AI and data-intensive applications. Both McCoy and Chandrasekaran are amongst the leadership of an NSF AI Institute proposal with PI Cathy Wu submitted in May 2024 for $20 million. The focus of the proposal combined foundational AI methods in collaboration with UD’s Physical Therapy department in order to improve patient recovery.

Partnering with Delaware Governor’s School for Excellence, Associate in Arts Program, the Provost’s Symposium, UD Faculty Senate, and more, McCoy provided talks on the fundamentals of AI and the role of AI in education.

In July 2024, the AICoE lead a hackathon in collaboration with Frederick National Laboratory and students from 7 universities including UD in attendance. Sponsors such as: NVIDIA, AWS, Collaborative Drug Discovery Vault, Tech Impact, Labware, NIIMBL, BVP Coffee Co., and UD’s Data Science Institute, Graduate College, and Center for Bioinformatics and Computational Biology made this event possible.

Upcoming activities

AICoE and UD’s Athletics department will partner on proof-of-concept projects starting Fall 2024 for AI and sports analytics.

With the recent NSF Award, the center will be involved with the formation of the RSE workforce starting September 2024. Graduate RAs will join the center in Fall 2024 for this and the Athletics initiatives.

Chandrasekaran will also be the Vice Chair of the Delaware AI Commission, bringing AICoE involvement to the state level.

The UD Cooperative Extension has also invited the center to provide insights on AI and the available tools at their upcoming Fall 2024 conference.

Many upcoming projects and new connections have contributed to the continual growth of the AICoE, which we plan to carry into 2025.

2022-2023, Year 1

Progress

On August 12, 2022, the AICoE was officially launched, garnering significant attention and attracting 53 affiliated faculty memebers across more than 20 departments and 7 colleges, in addition to hiring staff to support the center.

In September 2022, the center initiated its first round of Seed Funding, which called for research proposals leveraging machine learning to complement human impact, enabling advancements in medicine, science, engineering and software infrastructure enabled by AI. Out of the 22 Letters of Intent received in response to this call, 10 were selected to submit full proposals in October 2022, and 4 awards were selected. One project led by Xi Peng, Dept. of Computer and Information Sciences, was successfully selected for the Defense Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (DEPSCoR) grant from Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL).

The AICoE also fostered AI research opportunities for undergraduate students through its support program, providing funding for 5 students to work with AI-focused faculty throughout the Spring/Summer 2023 semesters.

The center has been actively participating in and organizing AI events for UD and industry. The center organized a successful workshop highlighting UD-AI research on January 23, 2023. The event featured talks from seed funding awardees, a panel on academic-industry collaboration, a poster session, and an AI bootcamp.

Co-director Kathy McCoy actively participated in and spoke at Tech Forum on March 22, 2023 on AI education. She also delivered a keynote at UD’s CTAL AI Teaching event on June 1, 2023.

The center hosted a lunch event with UD AI researchers to discuss themes for future funding opportunities on June 12, 2023.

Lastly, the AICoE proposed a Graduate Certificate in Artificial Intelligence, which passed through the faculty senate in April 2023, and becomes available in Fall 2023.

Upcoming activities

The AICoE will announce the second round of Seed Funding in Fall 2023 for funding in 2024 and supporting the next group of undergraduate researchers.

In collaboration with the Data Science Institute, there will be a Data Science and AI Hackathon in July 2023.

The center will relocate to the FinTech building on STAR campus, with the goal to foster ties with the businesses in and around STAR campus and the Delaware area.

The center will also participate in the upcoming AI Symposium in September 2023.

To help further foster these relationships, the AICoE will host a Lunchtime Seminar Series to bring together the AI community at UD and external partners to work on future large AI grant opportunities.