Two Princeton University computer science professors will lead a Google artificial intelligence lab that is scheduled to open in January in Princeton.Two Princeton University computer science professors will lead a Google artificial intelligence lab that is scheduled to open in January in Princeton.

The facility will be located at 1 Palmer Square and will start with a small number of faculty members, graduate and undergraduate student researchers, recent graduates and software engineers. The lab builds on several years of collaboration between technology company Google and Princeton professors Elad Hazan and Yoram Singer.

Their work will focus on a discipline within artificial intelligence known as machine learning, in which computers learn from existing information and develop the ability to draw conclusions and make decisions in new situations that were not in the original data, according to Princeton University.

Examples include speech recognition systems that transcribe a wide spectrum of voices, and self-driving cars that process complex visual cues. The work will build on recent advances by Hazan, Singer and colleagues in optimization methods for machine learning to improve their speed and accuracy while reducing the required computing power.

“Computing started at Princeton more than 80 years ago when alumnus Alan Turing first introduced a theory for how machines could calculate,” Emily Carter, dean of the Princeton School of Engineering and Applied Science said in a statement. “This collaboration is another excellent example of how fundamental insights in mathematics and theoretical computer science drive new technologies with benefits far beyond the original domain of the work.”