Intelligent Systems Laboratory
LAB OVERVIEW
• Research lab of the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, collaborates with other departments, universities, national labs, government agencies and industry.
• Supports the growing demand for research in applied and use-inspired Data Science, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML), Cybersecurity, and multi-disciplinary collaboration in AI.
VISION
At ISL we envision a future where the frontiers of science and technology not only expand human knowledge and capabilities in space exploration but also enhance our national security and intelligence operations, safeguarding our nation and allies.
HISTORY AND ACHIEVEMENTS
• Founded in 2017 by Dr. Bhattacharya building on experiences and collaborations formed as Visiting Research Fellow at Naval Research Lab (DC) and Army Research Lab (Adelphi, MD).
• Previous work on both mechanism (e.g. robotics) and software, currently focused on developing algorithms and software, and commercially available devices for testing.
• Supported by funding from Federal & State Govt agencies, industry through all years.
• ISL alumni placed in government jobs (some with clearance), industry and PhD programs.
RESEARCH AREAS
• Efficient AI/ML: develops AI algorithms and software for efficient execution on computing devices that operate at the edge in a constrained network, with limited access to electrical energy from battery. Brings AI/ML enabled analysis closer to the locations of data collection and sensing, reduces delay in decision-making, saves energy. Use-case: analysis in remote (e.g. space) & adversarial environments.
• AI/ML with synthetic data: solves the problem of training AI/ML models with little or no access to real data. Develops end to end solution, starting with simulation of environments and objects, increasing fidelity to physical world, collects synthetic data from simulation, trains AI/ML models, and closes the sim to real gap with fine-tuning and few shot learning. Increases accuracy of AI/ML models for categories of data that are rarely available. Use-case: data triage to find rare and uncommon objects.
• Generative AI for data transformation: trusted approaches for conversion of input documents to output documents by obfuscating information that is considered sensitive, confidential, or classified based on rules that are external to input documents. Use-case: de-classification of documents.
TEAM EXPERTISE
• ISL Director Dr. Bhattacharya has 15+ years of experience in grant funded research, collaboration with national labs, industry and in developing innovative educational programs.
• 13 Faculty members with subject matter expertise in multiple disciplines including Data Science, AI/ML, Cybersecurity, Educational Research, Social Science
FACILITIES AND RESOURCES
• On premise clusters (two) with servers connected on high-speed network, which contain advanced CPUs and GPUs for AI, and run Linux OS and cluster management software.
• In addition to on-premises capacity, ISL has access to a substantial commercial cloud AI computing allocation. Fayetteville State University has recently purchased $400,000, from Title III funds, of on-demand GPU compute in the Lambda Instances product category, which is owned by ISL. Lambda Instances provide single-node NVIDIA GPU hosts of one to eight GPUs, launched on demand and billed only for the minutes used, with GPU classes spanning NVIDIA Blackwell, H100, GH200 Grace Hopper, A100, A10, and RTX A6000 devices. The platform also provides local NVMe together with persistent, shared storage and GPUDirect RDMA networking. The environment is SOC 2 Type II compliant and is reached through a self-serve interface, an application programming interface (API), and a command-line interface (CLI), with 24-hour support.
• Wheeled robots, drones and edge computing devices for software prototyping and testing.
• Three rooms owned by ISL for research work. Secure server room with installed clusters.
PROJECTS AND RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS
Projects funded by Department of Defense (DoD) and in current collaborations with agencies of the US Intelligence Community (IC), by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to support program development and collaborations with DoD and IC, by NASA to work on current collaboration with the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL), and other projects funded by organizations within the state of North Carolina.
PHYSICAL LOCATIONS
Fayetteville State University
1200 Murchison Road
Fayetteville, NC 28301-4298
Lyon Science, Rm 133 (Robotics Lab) and Rm 133A (Prototyping Lab)
Science & Technology Building, Rm 335 (Computational Lab)
Science and Technology, Rm 214 (Office)
Lyons Science & Technology, Rm 340 (ISL Cluster Computer)
PHONE & FAX
Phone: (910) 672-1156
Fax: (910) 672-1070
