University of Melbourne Newsroom | 18 December 2013
The University of Melbourne will lead the establishment of a new $20M ARC Centre of Excellence, which will create innovative mathematical and statistical models for analysing big data sets.
Many data sets and collections have the potential to make vital contributions to society, business and government, as well as impact on international developments, but they are so large or complex that they are difficult to process and analyse using traditional tools, said Melbourne’s ARC Laureate Fellow, Professor Peter Hall.
Current solutions are ad-hoc, since adequate, mathematically founded statistical techniques currently do not exist. The aim of this Centre is to uncover the knowledge concealed within the size and complexity of these big data sets.
The new ARC Centre of Excellence for Mathematical and Statistical Frontiers of Big Data, Big Models, New Insights is aligned with the National Research Priority Area of Frontier Technologies for Building and Transforming Australian Industries.
University of Melbourne Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor James McCluskey said the new Centre will produce a lasting body of excellent and influential research, which has the potential to add real value to a range of areas from health care services and road traffic networks, to marine ecosystems, astrophysics and more.
Melbourne will lead the new Centre and work with researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, Queensland University of Technology, University of Adelaide, University of Oxford, University of Technology, Sydney, University of New South Wales, University of Queensland, Harvard School of Public Health, CSIRO, Australian Institute of Marine Science, Sax Institute, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Mathematics of Information Technology and Complex Systems, Canada, University of British Columbia, Vic Roads, AT&T Labs-Research.
