Dr. Anna Lasorella Wins the Inaugural Data Science Institute (DSI) Seed Funds Program Award

Dr. Anna Lasorella (and her collaborative Columbia team including Drs. David Blei (CU-Statistics), Raul Rabadan (Biomedical Informatics), and Wesley Tansey (Systems Biology) recently had their grant proposal titled, “Predicting Personalized Cancer Therapies Using Deep Probabilistic Modeling” chosen as one of five awardees for the inaugural DSI Seed Funds Program. The DSI will provide up to $100,000 for the first year funding period of their research.

According to the DSI, every field has data. We use data to discover new knowledge, to interpret the world, to make decisions, and even to predict the future. The recent convergence of big data, cloud computing, and novel machine learning algorithms and statistical methods is causing an explosive interest in data science and its applicability to all fields. The design of data science solutions requires both excellence in the fundamentals of the field and expertise to develop applications which meet human challenges without creating even greater risk.

The goal of the DSI Seeds Funds Program is to support new collaborations that will lead to longer term and deeper relationships among faculty in different disciplines across campus. Aimed at advancing research that combines data science expertise with domain expertise, the DSI Seed Funds Program focuses primarily on the second and third parts of their mission statement to (ii) transform all fields, professions, and sectors through the application of data science, and (iii) ensure the responsible use of data for the benefit of society.

Congratulations to Dr. Anna Lasorella and her team on their achievement!

Click here for more information on the DSI Seed Funds Program