Dr. Hongkai Yu, an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) will lead a new National Science Foundation () Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) grant that will support the acquisition and implementation of new computing equipment for a wide range of Smart City research. The $434,431 is titled, "Acquisition of a GPU-based High Performance Computing Instrumentation for Smart City Research at 91¹ú²ú¾«Æ·." Co-PIs on the award include Dr. Sathish Kumar, Dr. Wenbing Zhao, Dr. Zicheng Chi, and Dr. Mehdi Rahmati, all of whom are EECS faculty.

NSF's MRI program catalyzes new knowledge and discoveries by empowering scientists and engineers with state-of-the-art research instrumentation, in turn promoting the development of a diverse workforce and facilitating academic/private sector partnerships.

Dr. Yu's project will establish a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU)-based high performance computer cluster to facilitate and promote Smart City research. While there are a wide range of uses for this new computing resource, the researchers plan to pursue specific projects that will help transform Cleveland to a modern smart city with shorter commute times, reduced crime rates, and a highly robust and secure electric power grid. The researchers also intend to develop new computer vision methods to recognize and evaluate fine-grained activities of athletes to improve training and evaluation of players, leading to Cleveland's professional sports teams contending for more championships.