TROY — On Watson's last visit to Troy, during Homecoming weekend in 2011, it trounced RPI students and alumni in a pickup game of Jeopardy!, reprising its TV appearances earlier that year in which beat the program's top champions.

Now, a modified version of the IBM supercomputer is back on campus, this time to boost its capabilities while helping students and researchers as they tackle an assortment of problems.

John E. Kelly, IBM's senior vice president and director of research, said it was RPI's "get it done" attitude, as well as the quality of its administration and researchers, that brought Watson to Troy; RPI is the first university to have the computer system. Kelly, who earned his master's and doctoral degrees at RPI — his undergraduate degree is from Union College in Schenectady — spoke to students at RPI's Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center on Wednesday afternoon.

Since its TV appearances, Watson has been working at various health care institutions, including Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Cleveland Clinic, poring through data to help physicians make better, quicker diagnoses.

"The docs are blown away by what Watson can do" sifting through vast amounts of medical information in a very short time, Kelly said.

Named after IBM founder Thomas J. Watson, the computer is capable of analyzing unstructured data such as language and images.

While Watson will be used as a research tool, it also will be expanding its capabilities while at RPI.

And university officials expect it'll be a lure when it comes to recruiting researchers, faculty and students to the Troy campus.

"(T)he experience of working on Watson will give our students an advantage as they compete for the best jobs in Big Data, analytics and cognitive computing," said RPI President Shirley Ann Jackson.

RPI already has an IBM supercomputer housed at the Rensselaer Technology Park, and Jackson and Kelly said the computers, with their different strengths, could work together.

The supercomputer, for example, can perform calculations that Watson can't, said Kelly.

Watson's time at RPI was made possible by a three-year Shared University Research Award from IBM Research.

Late Wednesday, Watson already was being welcomed by students, among them the members of Phi Kappa Theta fraternity, who extended the supercomputer a bid, or membership invitation. "Phi Kappa Theta is always on the lookout for top caliber candidates to become brothers," explained the chapter's president, Joseph Arizzi.

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