Challenges and Opportunities in Applied Machine Learning

Machine-learning research is often conducted in vitro, divorced from motivating practical applications. A researcher might develop a new method for the general task of classification, then assess its utility by comparing its performance (for example, accuracy or AUC) to that of existing classification models on publicly available data sets. In terms of advancing machine learning as an academic discipline, this approach has thus far proven quite fruitful. However, it is our view that the most interesting open problems in machine learning are those that arise during its application to real-world problems. We illustrate this point by reviewing two of our interdisciplinary collaborations, both of which have posed unique machine-learning problems, providing fertile ground for novel research.