Punctuating the gray skies and rain that typify spring in the Pacific Northwest, the first week of April brought a sunny gathering of data scientists and engineers from multiple disciplines to Microsoft’s Redmond campus, where the second annual Open Data for Open Science workshop, or…
Posted by Rob Knies Each year, the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) recognizes several of its members for their contributions to computing by naming them as Fellows. Today, 46 ACM members have been named as Fellows—and six of them are from Microsoft Research, representing four…
The Jim Gray eScience Award—named for Jim Gray, a Technical Fellow at Microsoft Research and a Turing Award winner who disappeared at sea in 2007—recognizes innovators whose work makes science easier for other scientists.It was a special pleasure to be part of the audience in…
Through my work with academics in Brazil, I have witnessed an increasing awareness of the importance of computing in advancing scientific research in such areas as bioenergy, biodiversity, climate change, and plant physiology. In order to advance these fields, scientists need to deal with increasingly…
It’s long been known that many serious diseases—including heart disease, asthma, and many forms of cancer—run in families. Until fairly recently, however, medical researchers have had no easy way of identifying the particular genes that are associated with a given malady. Now genome-wide association studies,…
In the now decades-long battle against HIV and AIDS, researchers have been stymied by the virus’s ability to evade attacks by our immune system. Normally, a cell that is infected by a pathogen displays on its surface characteristic pieces of the pathogen peptides, known as…
I recently had the great pleasure of visiting with staff at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in Beijing, China. CAS is China's leading academic institution and comprehensive research and development center in natural science, technological science, and high-tech innovation. The Asia-Pacific Microsoft Research Connections…
Researchers believe that pathogens are evolving to evade detection from the human immune system. I recently co-published a paper that discussed research into the ongoing evolutionary struggle between the immune system and pathogens. In this study, we sought to identify possible commonalities in HLA (human…
A free, interactive virtual learning environment, WorldWide Telescope enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope. Through its interactive dashboard, you can browse high-resolution imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes, giving you a visually powerful perspective of the size, scale, and features…
Computers have increased the reach of biological science, altering the path of medicine with such revolutions as human genome sequencing—which is already causing a shift in treatment approach from epidemiological (based on patterns in the general population) to care that is tailored to individuals. Researchers…
Nearly 30 years since its discovery, the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) continues to prove a difficult virus to pin down because it mutates so rapidly—a trait which, so far, has made an effective vaccine for this often-deadly condition impossible to develop. That might change, thanks…
On November 30, I appeared on Health Tech Today, where I chatted with Dr. Bill Crounse about the Microsoft Biology Foundation and how it will help scientists advance their research. This interview marks yet another opportunity for Microsoft External Research to spread the word about…
