VICI Grant Awarded to Khalil Sima`an

The ILLC is very proud to announce that Khalil Sima'an has been awarded a Vici grant by NWO for his project proposal "Machine Translators: Teaching Computers to Translate Using Their Own Words". Khalil Sima'an has been granted 1,5 million euro for this project, which will have a duration of five years. During this period, the project will provide funding for 3 PhD students (4 years) and 2 postdocs (3 years). Sima'an and his team plan to develop new statistical models that learn from data how to automatically produce meaning preserving translations.

Vici is targeted at outstanding senior researchers who have successfully demonstrated the ability to develop their own innovative lines of research, and to act as coaches for young researchers. Unlike previous editions where the competition was contained within research fields, in the Vici round of 2013 applications from all research fields were assessed in a single, nationwide competition. In total, 32 Vici grants were awarded from among 218 submissions that participated in the 2013 competition.

See also http://www.nwo.nl/actueel/nieuws/2013/ for more information, or contact Khalil Sima´an at k.simaan at uva.nl.