For more than three decades, our team has been advancing the science and technology of information access.

In September 1992, the Center for Intelligent Information Retrieval (CIIR) was founded at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass) as a National Science Foundation State/Industry University Cooperative Research Center (S/IUCRC). Since then, CIIR has grown into one of the world’s leading research centers in information retrieval, working with more than 100 government and industry partners. Its research, licensed technologies, and open-source software have contributed to the development of modern search and information access systems.

On the 34th anniversary of CIIR, we are proud to bring our research to a new generation of real-world AI search technology.

Naget is a major technology-transfer effort of CIIR, developed in collaboration with the AIX Initiative at UMass, a university initiative focused on translating advances in artificial intelligence into real-world systems and applications. Naget builds on decades of research in information retrieval, machine learning, and intelligent information access, including state-of-the-art and patented technologies developed by our team.

Project Naget is led by CIIR and AIX members Chris Samarinas and Hamed Zamani. Together, the team brings 10+ years of experience in information retrieval, search systems, machine learning, and AI. Naget represents the next chapter of a research tradition that began at the CIIR in 1992: advancing how the world finds, understands, and uses information.