[reacharavindh]

1. Genetics and Genomics. The researchers I have worked with closely in the past have been outstanding scientists who have highlighted a huge room for computer engineers to step in and reap the benefits of applying software engineering and to a large extent - algorithms to solve large scale problems in the quantitative aspects of genetics and genomics. To give you a broad example, such methods are used in the breeding industry to find suitable mating bulls for cows to achieve a certain goal/feature - milk production, beef, even reduction in methane in their offsprings. I can only imagine the need for such methods in food and medicine which are huge industries.

2. spatial computing : If Apple’s foray into it has validated anything, it is that it is just getting started and it holds a lot of unrealized potential.

3. Robotics - it has been important for a long while, but its trajectory is still upwards and reach very promising.

[jkka]

In your given example, I know it's more complicated than that but it is basically an optimization algorithm, right?

[reacharavindh]

I unfortunately don’t have the detailed picture, but only several layman’s view of the problems they were working on. From what I understood, a lot of their research involved pattern recognition in strings of the size of about 4-6 GiB, combinatorics of smaller patterns, classification across multiple samples etc. I kept thinking these are elegantly solved problems in other domains, and if one were to possess both the skills of algorithms and the knowledge of what is it they are looking for, then it can click for a win.