Social Science: The Center for Really Neat Research aims to "do good things for the world."

By Stephen E. Cohen
Asst. Copy Editor

A new landlord has taken over the former Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house.

The Center for Really Neat Research has taken a two-year lease of the house at Comstock and University Place.

And the group does more than project movies on the large screen on the front of its house.

"We played 'Star Wars' on the night it opened (in theatres), and students were rushing, but they kept looking over and watching a little bit of it," said Dr. Dave Warner, founder of the Institute for Interventional Informatics.

After five years of planning, the joint venture between the Northeast Parallel Architectures Center, a research organization based in Syracuse University's Science and Technology building, and I3 has yielded the CRNR in Syracuse.

"(Warner) is a forward-looking, unique individual who has an M.D. from Loma Linda and is working on his Ph.D. and has a whole lot of experience with a whole lot of things," said Ed Lipson, professor and interim chairman of the SU physics department.

Warner accepted the Alec Nason Fellowship from NPAC in September 1995. The fellowship is a two-year grant that allows Warner to do significant, independent research without supervision or approval from SU.

Warner, who has received a one-year extension on the fellowship, said he works with academics, corporate people and other experts around the world.

All Kinds

CRNR, which includes Warner, Lipson, several SU students and faculty members, and various experts from around the world, has many different goals and projects in the works, Warner said.

Warner has worked with virtual reality, interface technology, parallel supercomputing, and neuroscience, among other things, Lipson said.

Students and faculty members from the School of Education, the College of Nursing, the industrial design department and the physics department are involved in the program, said Adrian Blanarovich, a senior bioengineering major who is working with the group.

Lipson said one of the group's primary projects is the use of interface technology to allow handicapped individuals to work with computers.

Funding for the project comes from a variety of sources. In addition to the Nason Fellowship, funding comes from I3, the National Science Foundation and others.

The group works with about $250,000 per year, Warner said.

The group's mission is to "be an entity that propagates the methodology of how to use information and technology intelligently to do something pro-social," Warner said.

Warner then translated: "To do good things for the world, use the technology, have fun," he said.

Moving Ahead

Eyal Sherman is a 15 year-old quadriplegic who lives in Syracuse and is a member of the research team.

Sherman, who has only facial movement, is interfaced with low-cost sensory devices, giving him the ability to play games, drive radio-controlled cars and scan the World Wide Web, said Matt Carbone, a senior industrial design major.

"We are using low-cost, deployable technology to become a social resource to anyone on the Web," Warner said.

The development of the Syracuse house has many facets, Warner said.

Industrial design students are using the location to design the "house of the future," he said.

They get a real house to experiment and have fun with, he added.

In the basement of the house, the group is setting up a clinic, where it can work with Sherman and other students similar to him.

All of the work is being done at the labs at Sci-Tech, but eventually moving to the house will give everyone more flexibility, Warner said.

The group is also working on a project called "Smart Desk." This project, part of Carbone's thesis, is a WWW based learning system.

A fast internet connection is "beamed" across the Quad to a small receiver in an upstairs window of the CRNR.

The connection allows the group to make its interfacing software available on the Web.

The ultimate goal is to "build a matrix of socially useful, acceptable technologies which will be based on this infrastructure," said Warner.

He said a similar group has been set up by Microsoft Corporation co-founder Paul Allen, who invested millions of dollars into the Washington-based project.

"We're going to kick their asses," Warner said.

Everything the group is doing gets posted to its website, www.pulsar.org.

Warner said an event will take place in upcoming weeks that will allow people to get a closer look at what is happening at the house.