Dr. Richard H. Granger Jr., a professor at the University of California, Irvine, was appointed as the first director of the Neukom Institute for Computational Science at Dartmouth last week.
Granger currently teaches in the computer science and cognitive science departments and directs the Brain Engineering Laboratory at UC Irvine. At Dartmouth, he will be the William H. Neukom Distinguished Professor in Computational Science as well as a member of the psychological and brain sciences department.
The Neukom Institute was founded in 2004 thanks to a $22 million gift from Neukom, current chair of the Dartmouth Board of Trustees and former chief legal officer at Microsoft. One of the institute's primary aims is to encourage interaction between computer science and other fields.
"We're hoping that there will be new interdisciplinary advances and that there will be new connections forged among people from different, sometimes disparate, corners of the campus," Granger said.
The interdisciplinary focus is a part of the institute's broader mission to contribute to the College's research and education efforts.
"My hope is that the institute can both enhance the learning experience and contribute to critical research in the arts and sciences," Neukom said in a statement released by the College. "With Professor Granger's help, I'm sure that Dartmouth will continue to have a leading role in pushing the frontiers of computation."
An example of the interdisciplinary research conducted by Granger is his examination of brain circuitry from an unorthodox vantage point.
"Brain circuits can be understood from a computational point of view," Granger said. "They're odd circuits -- in many ways they're not fashioned in ways that engineers are used to -- but nonetheless they can be understood with the language of engineering. So we treat them as circuits, stimulate them, observe their behavior and try to understand them literally almost as if we are taking apart a radio."
Among other advances, Granger has developed methods used in the early detection of Alzheimer's disease and other brain afflictions. In addition, he is a consultant to technology firms and government agencies.
The institute will also provide research opportunities in other rapidly developing fields.
"There are fields of science that are on the threshold of new levels of understanding. Examples are genetics, development, neuroscience and perception," Granger said. "All of a sudden, we have tools and discoveries that are enabling us to address questions with new insight."
The educational component of the institute will include faculty posts in computer science and other departments, research opportunities and fellowships for students and professors and an annual computational science symposium.
"We're hoping that we'll be able to bring interdisciplinary methods closer to students, that there will be a lot of mentoring activities and opportunities for undergrads," Granger said.
While the institute itself will not offer any classes, Granger plans to teach undergraduate courses, one of which, he hopes, will be offered next winter through the psychological and brain sciences department. He intends for the course to focus on computational neuroscience, and he said that it will be accessible to students from a wide variety of academic backgrounds.
"There are so many aspects of the Dartmouth community that I'm looking forward to. The collaborations that will be available with faculty and students, the environment and the collegiality of the place are immensely attractive," Granger said.
Granger, who received his undergraduate degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his Ph.D. from Yale University, will assume his new post on July 1.