Dr. Mohsen Ali and Dr. Izza Aftab have won Google Research Scholar Award 2021, according to an announcement on Google AI Blog. Dr. Ali is an assistant professor of computer science at the Information Technology University (ITU) in Lahore, Pakistan while Dr. Aftab is an assistant professor of economics at the same university. 

Google Research Award Recipients Professors Izza Aftab & Mohsen...

The Google Award is for a joint paper authored by the two Pakistani professors. It is entitled "Is Economics From Afar Domain Generalizable?". This research deals with the challenges of assessing economic indicators through machine learning. The paper shows how such indicators for a region can be developed from satellite imagery and geo-spatial datasets as an alternative to the on-site collection of administrative data that is done annually or biennially. This data helps design policy interventions, and paints a geo-spatial picture of economic well-being in developing countries like Pakistan. The findings from this project can aid governments and businesses.  

"Economics From Afar". Source: Dr. Mohsen Ali

Dr. Izza Aftab's interests include theory and modeling of firm level innovation in developing countries, the Economics of climate change, and role of Big Data in informing Public Policy. Dr. Mohsen Ali's research interests include solving theoretical and practical problems entailing Computer Vision, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning, specifically on the problems related to image co-segmentation, remote sensing, medical imaging and affective computing, according to ITU website.