Announcing Google’s Focused Research Awards – $5.7 million awarded in four areas

It is said that Google http://www.google.com is like a university — and not just because everyone eats their lunch off trays in the cafeteria.

Like a university, we devote significant energy to research across a wide array of subjects — from semantics to help improve search, to ways we can improve the efficiency of our data centers. Along with our internal efforts, we’ve long invested in building a strong, mutually beneficial relationship with universities and the research community.

We give approximately 150 research grants a year to fund projects across a variety of subjects, we host visiting faculty members here at Google on sabbatical, and last year we started the Google Fellowship Program to fund graduate students doing innovative research in several fields.

Today, we’re announcing the first-ever round of Google Focused Research Awards — funding research in areas of study that are of key interest to Google as well as the research community. These awards, totaling $5.7 million, cover four areas: machine learning, the use of mobile phones as data collection devices for public health and environment monitoring, energy efficiency in computing, and privacy. These are all areas in which Google is already deeply invested, and yet there is a long way to go. We’re excited to see what these projects contribute to the body of research in these important areas.

Full Story: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/02/announcing-googles-focused-research.html