CSC News

DK Xu Awarded Microsoft’s AFMR Award

In a significant recognition of pioneering research work, Dr. Dongkuan (DK) Xu, an Assistant Professor in NC State University's Department of Computer Science, has been honored with the Microsoft Accelerating Foundation Models Research (AFMR) Award. This accolade is for his groundbreaking proposal, "Scalable and Adaptable Evaluation of LLMs' Trustworthiness Through Generative Techniques," which seeks to address the critical challenge of assessing the trustworthiness of large language models (LLMs).

Xu's innovative approach involves the use of generative techniques to create diverse and domain-specific evaluation benchmarks. This method aims to facilitate a more scalable and adaptable evaluation framework, ensuring LLMs' reliability and safety in critical applications. The award, part of Microsoft's initiative to support academic research in foundation models, underscores the importance of Xu's work in advancing AI technology's responsible use and development.

"AI is evolving at an unprecedented pace, making it imperative to ensure the systems we create are trustworthy and beneficial," said Xu. "This award from Microsoft Research not only recognizes our efforts but also provides crucial support to advance our research in making AI technologies safer and more reliable for everyone."

The AFMR initiative by Microsoft is designed to foster collaboration and innovation among the global academic community, supporting research that aligns AI with human values and societal needs. This Microsoft Research grant, which carries a monetary award of $30,000 in Azure credits with access to state-of-the-art Azure Open AI Service and GPT-4, will enable Xu and his team to expand their research capabilities, exploring new methodologies for evaluating AI trustworthiness. The project's success could lead to the development of more robust and transparent AI systems, ultimately benefiting a wide range of applications from healthcare to autonomous driving.

Xu leads the NCSU Generative Intelligent Computing Lab, focusing on the autonomy of intelligent agents and the reliability of decision-making in AI systems. His work spans several aspects of AI, including natural language processing, computer vision, and hardware optimization, with numerous contributions to top-tier conferences and journals in these fields.

For more information about Xu's research and the award-winning project, please visit Xu's personal and NC State University web pages: https://dongkuanx27.github.io/.

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