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University Of Rochester Makes Big Commitment To "Big Data"

The University of Rochester is making a $100 million commitment to data science. The announcement was made Friday by university president Joel Seligman during the "Rochester Big Data Forum," an event where researchers from around the country are meeting to talk about data science.

The university is making a commitment of $50 million in addition to the more than $50 million it has spent in recent years. The financial support will include the creation of an Institute for Data Science, as well as a state of the art building to house it, and as many as 20 new faculty members with expertise in that field.

Officials say data science can help extract useful information from the vast quantity of data that is created every day. It has already been used in research to predict the spread of infectious diseases, track the popularity of political ideas and to understand consumer preferences.

Randy Gorbman is WXXI's director of news and public affairs. Randy manages the day-to-day operations of WXXI News on radio, television, and online.