APPLICATIONS

Funding, software, data and collaboration awarded for promising research into the cutting edge of map-based information systems. Microsoft Research today announced the recipients of $1.1 million (U.S.) in funding for academic researchers working on geographic information-visualization techniques and location-based Web searching. The 21 winners were chosen from more than 140 university applicants worldwide in response to Microsoft Research’s parallel SensorMap and Virtual Earth requests for proposals (RFPs). The innovative and diverse projects to be supported by the gifts from Microsoft Corp. include the ability to combine data from tiny sensors, the Internet and a variety of other sources with map information and geographic imagery such as that provided by Microsoft Virtual Earth. The university research teams aim to study and map the physical world in real time, to push the technological boundaries of local search, and to understand the potential societal impact of these kinds of geographic technologies. New solutions ultimately resulting from the research are expected to yield rich and diverse benefits, such as helping tourists find affordable restaurants with the shortest lines, or helping scientists understand changes in the ecology of biological systems under the threat of climate change. "Being able to map real-time data happening in the physical world onto a computer will have tremendous societal impact – observing weather patterns, calculating soil erosion, sensing pollution, the applications seem endless," says Stewart Tansley, a program manager in the External Research & Programs group in Microsoft Research. "The ability to collect massive amounts of real-time data and apply it to the world we live in by visualizing it on a 'live' map is very exciting. Any one of the RFP projects has the potential to change the way people live, commute to work or build a structure, as well as empower scientists in their increasingly important environmental research." "We believe scientific research can be highly enriched through access to geographic presentation assets," said Gur Kimchi, software architect for Microsoft’s Virtual Earth business unit. “Data gathering is an expensive operation today. These RFPs allow us to share and utilize the rich data we’ve collected for the benefit of the scientific community, with the potential ultimately to enhance scientists’ understanding of ecology, meteorology, epidemiology and virtually any field of inquiry that can benefit from displaying and analyzing data geographically." SensorMap: Browsing the Physical World in Real Time Live Search Maps, a geo-centric Web interface based on Virtual Earth technology, is useful for visualizing spatial and geographic data such as locations, neighborhoods, weather, and traffic. Researchers expressed interest in creating custom applications that overlay their own data on top of these browsable maps, such as housing information, crime-rates, locations of vehicles and pod casters, and weather. This was made possible when the Virtual Earth team published APIs [application programming interfaces] to overlay location data on their maps – but unfortunately this is a limited solution. Publishing even a single stream of data requires a lot of effort and some programming expertise. Existing applications are mutually incompatible – for example, no single map can show both housing information and crime-rates in an area. And existing solutions are not capable of querying live sensors based on keywords or location, and aggregating the results in useful ways. The SenseWeb project at Microsoft Research aims to address these challenges by providing a common platform and set of tools for data owners to easily publish data and for users to make queries of the live data sources. The SensorMap platform, developed from the SenseWeb project, transparently provides mechanisms to archive and index data, to process queries, and to aggregate and present results on Web interfaces such as Virtual Earth. "It's fantastic; the resources this provides us allows us to expand our project and get to the data more effectively and efficiently. Without this RFP we would have had to build the entire project from scratch,” says Matt Welsh, an assistant professor of computer science at Harvard University who is working on CitySense, an NSF-funded urban-scale sensor network testbed that will allow remote users to reprogram nodes, acquire data, and otherwise experiment with various algorithms and protocols. Harvard University, BBN Technologies, and the City of Cambridge have begun a four-year project to install 100 wireless sensors atop streetlights in Cambridge, Mass., creating the world's first city-wide network of wireless sensors. Sponsored by the National Science Foundation, the project is open-source, meaning it could eventually be accessible to researchers worldwide for everything from gathering meteorological data to monitoring traffic conditions and noise pollution. CitySense will focus initially on monitoring air pollution and weather conditions, collecting data on a scale never before attempted. "Wireless sensor networks have the potential to revolutionize the real-time monitoring of the environment, civil structures, roadways, and animal habitats," says Welsh. "This will be one of the largest projects of its kind, and the entire 100-sensor infrastructure will eventually be open to anyone with a computer and an internet connection. That could mean an atmospheric science researcher in Tulsa or a 10th grade high school teacher in San Francisco would only have to design an experiment and sign up for a time slot to run it on CitySense." Josh Bers, Welsh's collaborator at BBN Technologies, is designing the wireless sensor nodes. By using multi-hop wireless networking software that links each node with its neighbors to form a mesh, Bers can ensure that CitySense remains available to researchers despite the harsh weather atop city streetlights. The City of Cambridge is playing an important role in this project, supporting the sensor installation on light poles throughout the city. CitySense's first task will be to monitor air pollution transport in a dense urban environment for Majid Ezzati, associate professor of international health in the Harvard School of Public Health. Ezzati hopes to gain valuable data on airborne pollutants' public health impact. Since data will be collected from multiple sources across the city, the sensors will provide a more complete picture of environmental data than current data collected locally from one center. "We developed the SensorMap portal as a step toward the vision of creating a World Wide Sensor Web," says Feng Zhao, a principal researcher who leads the group that developed SensorMap technology at Microsoft. "SensorMap enables data owners to easily publish and share sensor data, and also lets users query and browse live data on a geographic interface such as Virtual Earth." External Research & Programs’ Investment in the Future of Academic Research Today’s funding is part of the External Research & Programs group’s broader collaboration model, one that underscores Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to investing deeply in innovative research. External Research & Programs engages and collaborates with top researchers from the worldwide academic community to explore emerging areas of research and technology. The group works closely within Microsoft Research to identify current trends and challenges in technology, and issues broad calls to the academic community in the form of RFPs. The best proposals are provided with seed funds, relevant software, data and access to Microsoft Research. Many of the projects supported by these grants go on to receive funding from public organizations such as the National Science Foundation, or deepen their relationship with Microsoft through other forms of collaboration. In addition to the unrestricted monetary awards, winners of the SensorMap RFP will receive access to Microsoft’s SensorMap geographic sensor-data publishing platform, enabling them to integrate and publish searchable data through a map interface. The Virtual Earth RFP winners will receive some of Microsoft’s Web-based geographic imagery, which in combination with the Interactive Virtual Earth software development kit will enable researchers to explore potential applications of location-based Web searches. Understanding the vital role that academia plays, the External Research & Programs group at Microsoft collaborates with university researchers around the world, focusing on current real-world issues, cutting-edge research, challenges facing the academic ecosystem, and innovative approaches to education that prepare students for the challenges of the future. Every year, Microsoft Research publishes RFPs in specific subject areas – in 2006 alone, $4 million in software, technical resources and funding was awarded to the most promising academic researchers. When the Virtual Earth and SensorMap RFPs were first announced, they sparked worldwide interest – over the few weeks they were open for application, the Virtual Earth RFP received nearly 80 proposals from 17 countries, and SensorMap received 60 proposals from 13 countries. “The ability to search for and analyze information within the context of location is a field with great potential,” said Sailesh Chutani, director of External Research & Programs, the arm of Microsoft Research that works closely with academic institutions. “These researchers are using a powerful new approach to solve fundamental problems, and our programs are designed to help them in a number of ways — funding to bring in additional resources, software and data to use in experiments, access to top researchers at Microsoft, and collaboration with the broader, global research community.” The winning projects are already generating interest – and enthusiasm. “I think the most exciting thing is how this technology is so immediately impactful,” says Evelyne Viegas, a program manager with External Research & Programs. “We are working with academics who are literally mapping new ways for us to live on this planet. The proposals themselves are fascinating, but I cannot wait to see the results of this research.” Source: Microsoft PressPass. Article published with the permission of Microsoft Corporation.