composite image of data and people

Data and Human-Centered Solutions Innovation Center

Building a world where our most critical decisions are driven by evidence and centered on humans.

The decision-making challenges our sponsors face are complex and fast-moving, with potentially significant real-world consequences. Working across health, military, critical infrastructure, and other key spaces of public interest, our goal is to ensure decisions are driven by data synthesized with the power of human insight, ethics, and creativity.

Data-driven, intelligent systems can bring immense computing power to bear, revealing insights across datasets too massive for humans to synthesize. We aim to build and enable those systems by creating trusted data engineering architectures, machine learning algorithms, and analytic techniques that put the power of big data at our users' fingertips.

At the same time, we recognize that in critical and complex decision-making, intelligent systems must augment human analysis rather than replace it. Our goal: leverage deep expertise in human decision-making and collaboration to best pair humans and machines. In this way, we develop solutions that combine the computational power of intelligent data-driven systems with the creativity, ethics, context awareness, and accountability of humans.

To tackle these challenges, the Data & Human-Centered Solutions Innovation Center (DHCS IC) acts as a hub where five key technology areas come together to support innovation at the intersection of humans, decisions, and data. The five departments in this Innovation Center span the disciplines of:

  • Social & Behavioral Sciences
  • Collaboration & Social Computing
  • Data Science
  • Geospatial & Analytic Solutions
  • Data Engineering & Environments

This cross-disciplinary cooperation enables the DHCS IC to build solutions that enhance decisions, enable collaboration, and empower users.

Our Focus Areas

Enhanced Human Understanding

Drive innovation in how we understand humans through data

Augmented Decision-making

Augment human decision-making through the power of data and collaboration

Trusted Analytics

Data analytics and analysis techniques that are explainable, rigorous, and reproducible

Next-Gen Data Environments

Enable data-centered systems through next-generation data solutions

Enhanced Human Understanding

Drive innovation in how we understand humans through data

Augmented Decision-making

Augment human decision-making through the power of data and collaboration

Trusted Analytics

Data analytics and analysis techniques that are explainable, rigorous, and reproducible

Next-Gen Data Environments

Enable data-centered systems through next-generation data solutions

Independent Research

Nudge Research Program

We help guide people to make better decisions—through small choices with big impact.

Our Impact

R&D Centers

We operate six federally funded research and development centers—private, nonprofit organizations for the public interest.