The Duke Endowment recently awarded the University $30 million to hire new faculty in support of computing, artificial intelligence and machine learning research.
The gift will support the creation of the new Elevating Duke Computing program, according to an Aug. 20 Giving to Duke announcement. The “historic” program, to be led by Provost Alec Gallimore, will fund the “hiring and start-up costs” for a senior “luminary” faculty member and four to seven mid-career faculty over the next five years.
“Major academic institutions around the world are preparing for a dynamic frontier in computing,” Gallimore said in the announcement. “This award from The Duke Endowment will help Duke mobilize our ecosystem of collaboration across disciplines to lead in the next frontier of computing.”
The Elevating Duke Computing program will be considered part of the broader Duke Science and Technology initiative, which the University launched in 2019 with a $100 million donation from the Duke Endowment. Per the initiative’s website, Duke is “home to the world's top lab in interpretable AI.”
Past examples of innovative science and technology research supported by the initiative have included an app that screens children for autism, autonomous robots that can perform surgery and developments in AI and quantum computing for fighting drug-resistant diseases.
Beyond AI, Duke is a leader in quantum computing, having developed “the world’s leading quantum information processing architecture” through the Duke Quantum Center. The University also has close ties to IonQ, a leading quantum computing company, which was co-founded by Christopher Monroe, Gilhuly family presidential distinguished professor, and Jungsang Kim, Schiciano family distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering.
“Advances in computing are critical to solving today’s most complex and challenging problems, across all sectors,” said President Vincent Price, per the announcement. “This award from The Duke Endowment will support the University’s work to drive knowledge and discovery and empower the next generation of leaders in computing.”
According to the announcement, the Elevating Duke Computing program’s first hires will join the department of computer science in the Trinity College of Arts & Sciences and the department of electrical and computer engineering in the Pratt School of Engineering.
In hiring a “world-class scholar,” Duke seeks to raise its profile in the field of computing while also enabling the creation of new coursework, research, partnerships and funding.
According to Dean of Trinity College Gary Bennett, the incoming hires “will accelerate breakthroughs in computing [and] enhance computing education at all levels at Duke,” in addition to broadening the application of computing advances to new domains.
The Duke Endowment, a private foundation and Duke’s largest donor, has donated nearly $2 billion to the University and its health system over the past century.
Editor's note: This article was updated Monday morning to add Kim as another co-founder of IonQ.
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Michael Austin is a Trinity junior and managing editor of The Chronicle's 120th volume.