Back in 2011, we launched a new program called Google Exacycle for Visiting Faculty, making a call for projects that would consume 100M+ core-hours each and be of critical benefit to society. As a result, visiting scientists have been working at Google running large computing experiments on Google’s infrastructure; their projects range from protein folding and structural modeling to the dynamic universe. You can read a progress report on the Research at Google blog, and check out the interview with Googler Joseph Hellerstein, who works on cloud infrastructure and talks in-depth about his collaborations with some of these visiting scientists.

Co-leaders of the Big Picture visualization group in Google's Cambridge, MA office, Martin Wattenberg and Fernanda Viégas are the minds behind compelling visualizations, such as Google+ Ripples.  Authors of more than 30 academic papers, Martin and Fernanda are committed to a rigorous understanding of visualization informed by academic research. Prior to joinging Google, Martin and Fernanda founded Flowing Media, Inc., a visualization studio focused on media and consumer oriented projects.  Before this, the two led IBM's Visual Communication Lab, creating the public visualization platform Many Eyes.  Read more about their work in our Google+ interview.

This May, Google sponsors WWW 2013, hosted in Rio de Janeiro. Organized by the IW3C2, the WWW conference is an annual event which explores the future direction of the World Wide Web, drawing industry professionals, developers, researchers, and all those who are passionate about the Web to discuss its evolution and impact on society. Google will be present to share our research on topics including Big Data, Search, Visualization, and more, with Googlers presenting multiple papers, tutorials, and workshops. Visit the Google exhibit schedule to see details on the Google's participation at WWW 2013, including in-booth demos, paper presentations, and more.