Lassonde Professor codes path to success with support from tech giant

Laleh Seyyed-Kalantari, an assistant professor in the Electrical Engineering & Computer Science department at York University’s Lassonde School of Engineering, recently received a monetary gift from Google as part of the company’s Research Scholar Program.

“This is a highly competitive award, and it is a pleasure to represent York and Lassonde among a prestigious community of recipients from top-tier universities,” says Professor Seyyed-Kalantari. “This award will also help open doors to future collaborations and prestigious grants.”

Google’s Research Scholar Program aims to support early-career professors by providing generous funding and encouraging the formation of long-term partnerships. The funding is considered an unrestricted gift to help professors advance their cutting-edge work, ranging from quantum computing to health research.

Professor Seyyed-Kalantari’s research focuses on investigating and improving fairness of artificial intelligence (AI) models used in medical practices. Her laboratory, Responsible AI Lab, is currently tackling many projects, including fairness of AI in medical imaging and large language models and AI applications in drug discovery. She is one of many talented Lassonde researchers working on York University’s multi-million dollar project, Connected Minds: Neural and Machine Systems for a Healthy, Just Society.

“After receiving the award, my research group and I met with Google to share research ideas and plan collaborative projects,” she says. “This will be a great opportunity for my students to work closely with an industry leader and advance our research.”

With a budding partnership and vote of confidence from Google, Professor Seyyed-Kalantari is prepared to address challenges of AI in healthcare settings through her research.

Learn more about Professor Seyyed-Kalantari’s ongoing research in her Responsible AI Lab.