HOT research fields in Computer Science

[NickZ]

Hi, all:

I'd like to discuss hot research fields, or subfields, with you guys interested in applying for CS phd.

Everyone, to his/her best knowledge gives 3 ~ 5 hottest research fields in Computer Science, and I believe it will not only help me, but also everyone else to get some idea about it.

The criteria that occurred to me when defining "hot" are (no implication in ranking of importance):

1. has a future for advancing current technology to a next level within 10 ~ 20 years;

2. has wide application in industry so that having sufficient funding;

3. has larger group of researchers active than other subfields of CS

I understand that there can be conflicts since the technology seeming promising in academia does not usually attract industry's eye for the simple reason that academia leads the industry for quite a few years.

But look, we're all humans and not machines that can only rigorously follow rules in a mathematical way. Subjectivity is allowed and don't worry about it.

So start from me (no implication in ranking of importance):

1. VLSI and its replacement (such as quantum computers)

2. computer architecture (particularly for data center)

3. language semantics (including the combination of computational linguistics, machine learning, etc)

4. database

[newms]

Hey Nick, maybe if you asked this question in the Computer Science forum more CS people will see this topic.