國際知名資訊科技領袖舒維都 Professor Victor Zue, 教授應邀任中大工程學院講座嘉賓

 28 May 2002

World-renowned IT expert lectures on "Project Oxygen" at CUHK


           Imagine if you want to know what the weather is like or the flight schedule in the US, all you need to do is to make a call.  The computer will "listen" to your question, then "search" for relevant information on the internet, and "tell" you the answers.

           Consider the moment your step into your house, the computer will "see" you and "recognize" you through a camera, and automatically adjust the room temperature and level of lightness to the way you like them to be.

           To Professor Victor Zue, the mastermind behind "Project Oxygen" of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), such kind of futuristic living style is not just reachable to the mankind, but may even be something that has already been realized.

           A world-renowned figure in the technology arena, Professor Victor Zue is currently Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT and Director of the Institute's Laboratory for Computer Science.  He spent his early years in Hong Kong, and obtained his PhD from MIT in 1976.  Professor Zue has worked on speech interfaces research for over 25 years.  His main research interest is in the development of spoken language interfaces to make human-computer interaction easier and more natural.  Recently, his group pioneered the development of many systems that enable a user to interact with computers using multiple spoken languages (English, Japanese, Putonghua and Spanish).  For his innovative research work, he has been named one of the five "trailblazers" in speech interfaces worldwide by Business Week.

           "Project Oxygen" led by Professor Victor Zue strives to bring about revolutionary changes in the ways computers and humans interact through a vision of pervasive, human-centered computing.  In the future, computation will be freely available everywhere, like batteries and power sockets, or oxygen in the air we breathe.  Computation will enter the human world, handling our goals and needs.  The US$40 million project was sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the US Department of Defense.  The Oxygen Alliance was formed between MIT and six world-class companies – Delta, Acer, Hewlett Packard, NTT, Nokia, and Philips.

           Professor Zue has consulted for many multinational corporations, and he has served on many planning, advisory, and review committees for the US Department of Defense.  Locally, he has also advised the Hong Kong government on the strategic planning of information technology in a book Made By Hong Kong which he co-authored.  He proposed a number of innovative ideas on Hong Kong's future in information technology.  They include an urge for the government to promote information technology, the projections that Hong Kong has the niche to become a telecommunications hub, Hong Kong should develop logistics and supply chain industry, the development of e-commerce and e-banking, etc.

           Professor Ching Pak-Chung, Dean of Engineering at CUHK invited Professor Victor Zue to deliver a Distinguished Lecture to commemorate the Faculty's 10th Anniversary.  Professor Ching said, "Since its foundation in 1991, the Faculty of Engineering at CUHK has strived to nurture excellent engineers for the industry, and develop innovative technologies to benefit society.  The teaching and research staff in our Faculty look forward to a valuable academic exchange during Professor Zue's visit.  Our students will also benefit from Professor Zue's words of wisdom.  Such academic exchanges are conducive to the advancement of knowledge and research in our Faculty."

           The remarkable achievements of the Faculty of Engineering at CUHK over the decade are well recognized.  The Faculty has reached an international standard in both its teaching and research.  For example, many of the research projects pioneered by Professor Helen Mei-Ling Meng of the Department of Systems Engineering and Engineering Management are at the forefront of today's technologies.  Such projects include: "CU Vocal" - a Chinese speech synthesis system that can transform input text into output speech with a natural voice, and the "CU Audio Search Engine" - a search engine which can help users find relevant Cantonese, Putonghua and English news clips based on an input textual query.

           Professor Victor Zue delivered a Distinguished Lecture entitled "Project Oxygen: Towards Pervasive, Human-centered Computing" on CUHK campus.



國際知名資訊科技領袖舒維都教授
應邀任中大工程學院講座嘉賓


　　倘若你想知道美國的即時天氣、航機班次，只要撥一通電話，裝有語音辨識系統的電腦「聽」到問題後，會自己上網去「找」相關資訊，再「說」給你知答案，就像在和朋友通電話一樣。

　　當你回到家中，電腦透過攝影機「看見」你，並「認出」你，立刻把室溫和光線調到你喜歡的模樣歡迎你回家。

　　這些聽似未來世界的生活模式，對麻省理工學院（MIT）「活氧計劃」(Project Oxygen)主腦人舒維都教授來說，不單指日可待，甚至已經逐步實現。

　　在科技界享負盛名的舒維都教授，現任美國麻省理工電機工程與計算機科學教授兼計算機科學研究所所長。早年於香港生活，並於一九七六年在麻省理工獲電機及電腦博士學位。被《商業周刊》(Business Week) 譽為全球五位語音介面技術先驅之一的舒維都，投入研究語音科技超過二十五年，其主導的「對話介面」(Conversational interface) 項目，是一種高科技語音人機介面。系統在辨識語音並了解後，即連上互聯網找尋答案，最後再以語音合成回應。有關研究已經完成旅遊、線上購物及氣象報告幾項應用。舒維都的語音技術，使得人類以語音與電腦「對話」的夢想逐步實現。

　　由舒維都教授領導的「活氧計劃」，耗資四千萬美元，預期進行5 年，主要目的為研發新一代以人為本、具雙向溝通能力的人性化電腦。科技會像氧氣一般，成為我們生活不可或缺的一環，直接融合到建築物及日常生活的各種工具中。「活氧計劃」由美國國防部創新科技計劃事務署贊助，參與研發的科技公司包括：台達電（Delta）、宏�（Acer）、美國惠普公司（Hewlett Packard）、日本電話電報公司（NTT）、歐洲的諾基亞研發中心（Nokia）以及飛利浦研發中心（Philips）六家公司。

　　舒維都教授不單為美國國防部、自然科學基金會及國家科學研究院擔任顧問工作，並為多家跨國企業的顧問。舒教授亦為本港的科技發展出謀獻策，貢獻至鉅。早於九七年，舒教授已於《香港製造》一書中為香港的資訊科技發展繪畫藍圖。舒教授當年提出多項開創性的建議及預期，包括香港政府應致力推動資訊科技、發展香港成為電訊樞紐、香港應發展物流及供應鏈行業、以及電子商貿及網上銀行的發展等，到了今天亦一一實現。

　　舒維都教授對香港中文大學工程學院的發展提出不少指導及啟發。對舒教授應邀訪問中文大學工程學院並擔任十周年講座演講嘉賓，該院院長程伯中教授深表歡迎，他表示：「中大工程學院自一九九一年創院以來，一直以培育一流的科技人才，開拓創新科技發展造福社群而努力。能夠邀請到世界級學者舒維都教授在中大講學，擴闊學生的眼界，讓中大的學者及研究人員與舒教授作學術交流，對進一步提升本院的教學水平有莫大助益」。

　　而中文大學工程學院十年以來的成績亦有目共睹，其教學及研究已擠身國際一流大學的水平。該院系統工程與工程管理學系蒙美玲教授的人機通訊實驗室，多項研究均走在科技時代的尖端。舉例來說，有中大「悠揚」語音合成系統(CU Vocal) — 透過電腦將文字轉化為自然人聲，以及中大多媒體搜尋器(CU Audio Search Engine) — 一個以輸入文字即可搜尋廣東話、普通話及英語電視新聞片段等突破性研究項目。

　　舒維都教授在中大舉行傑出公開講座，講題為「麻省理工學院的Oxygen項目」。

二零零二年五月二十八日