USM, Hyperion Technology Group Collaborate on Recent NOAA Grant

Wed, 09/27/2023 - 08:33am | By: Van Arnold

The University of Southern Mississippi’s (USM) partnership with Mississippi-based Hyperion Technology Group is expected to yield significant dividends as the two research and technology titans collaborate to develop a Data Assembly Hub for Uncrewed Systems. The collaboration is the product of a $2.5 million grant awarded recently to USM by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA).

NOAA officials reached out to USM in 2020 seeking new ideas to handle the rapidly growing data produced by the agency’s Uncrewed Systems, which are autonomous or remotely operated vehicles that collect environmental data. That inquiry led to a successful pilot project which provided the foundation for the grant.

Dr. Henry Jones, Director of Research Development and Scientific Entrepreneurship at USM, notes that Hyperion played an important role from the beginning. Jones served as Principal Investigator for the NOAA grant.

“When we were first getting our heads around the enormous data sizes NOAA would be handling, we looked for lessons already learned elsewhere,” said Jones. “We were aware that the Department of Defense had tackled similar data challenges in the global war on terror, and fortunately we identified Hyperion Technology Group, who could bring in that expertise.”

Based in Tupelo, Miss., Hyperion Technology Group got its start in 2009 at the Renasant Center for IDEAs. Since that time, the company has collaborated with mission partners across all sensor-driven industries to research, develop, and deliver advanced sensor engineering and signal processing solutions.

The company currently has 72 employees – 57 in Tupelo; 13 in Dayton, Ohio, and two in Charlotte, N.C. In addition to USM, Hyperion works with other universities, including the University of Mississippi and Mississippi State University.

Hyperion founder, President, and Chief Executive Officer Geoff Carter describes the collaboration with USM as a critical part of the company’s mission.

“We rely on our university partners to cover the basic research part of our efforts while Hyperion focuses on the applied engineering,” said Carter. “We take great pride in the fact that we have worked with many universities, both domestically and internationally, and have developed many great relationships through these partnerships and we continue to collaborate with all of our university partners in efforts to bring more work to both the university and Hyperion.”

Carter explains that Hyperion features a multi-faceted disciplinary team with knowledge, skills, and experience supporting NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) mission.

“Specifically, in partnership with The University of Southern Mississippi, Hyperion brings to bear the success of past research efforts for NOAA’s Aquatic Video Information Enhancement Workplace (AQUA VIEW),” he said. “Together, with USM, we will create a Data Assembly Hub that will bring together federated data sources across NOAA and other existing public domain data sources to provide users with a singular platform to search, access, and review the available data.”

Dr. Joshua Hill, Associate Professor in the School of Criminal Justice, Forensic Science and Security at USM, has worked closely with Hyperion over the past four years. He served as Co-Principal Investigator for the NOAA grant. Hill points out that Hyperion’s unique set of skills will provide a tremendous asset to the grant project.

“Hyperion has essential skills in artificial intelligence and machine learning, as well as in general computing,” said Hill. “We have used all of these areas of expertise across the project, both for understanding how to better prepare data for analysis in next generation applications as well as designing the architecture we’ve implemented so far.”

Hill emphasizes that the benefits of USM’s collaboration with Hyperion cannot be overstated.

“In addition to their Mississippi location, working with Hyperion has allowed us to interact with the leading edge of AI/ML development, as the commercial space, in many ways, surpassed academia in these areas,” said Hill. “Additionally, having their previous experience in the area of big-data integration available to us has been invaluable for the development of the project.”

Added Jones, “Everyone on the team believes that we are building long-term solutions for long-term problems – the quest for data is only accelerating. This NOAA project aligns with our strategy to be an integral part of the blue economy future.”