Paola Cascante-Bonilla is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Stony Brook University, with expertise in computer vision, natural language processing, and embodied AI. Her research focuses on developing systems for compositional reasoning, common-sense inference, and trustworthy AI using vision-language models, while addressing cultural bias and explainability challenges.
Jiajun Wu is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science and, by courtesy, of Psychology at Stanford University. He holds multiple affiliations including membership in Bio-X, Faculty Affiliate status at the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI), and membership in both the Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance and Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute. Dr. Wu earned his Ph.D. and S.M. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before joining Stanford. Dr. Wu's research program focuses on creating AI systems that understand and interact with the physical world through the integration of computer vision, machine learning, robotics, and cognitive science. His work emphasizes physics-based modeling combined with deep learning to develop systems capable of perceiving, reasoning about, and predicting physical interactions. Key research areas include 3D scene understanding, neurosymbolic AI approaches, multimodal perception (combining vision, sound, and language), and embodied intelligence for robotics applications. His lab develops novel frameworks that bridge the gap between neural networks and symbolic reasoning to create more interpretable and robust AI systems. Analysis of Dr. Wu's recent publications reveals a strong trajectory toward integrated multimodal understanding for embodied AI. His work increasingly combines vision, sound, and language processing with physical reasoning to create systems that can interact meaningfully with the physical world. There's a clear progression from foundational computer vision research toward practical robotics applications, with significant emphasis on foundation models for robotics, sim2real transfer techniques, and creating comprehensive datasets for embodied AI research. Dr. Wu's exceptional contributions have been recognized with numerous prestigious awards including the NSF CAREER award (2024), Young Investigator Programs from ONR (2024) and AFOSR (2023), the Okawa research grant (2024), and being named to IEEE Intelligent Systems' 'AI's 10 to Watch' (2024). He has received multiple best paper awards at leading conferences including ICRA (2024), SIGGRAPH Asia (2023), and CoRL (2023). Dr. Wu actively mentors a large cohort of students across multiple levels, serving as primary advisor for doctoral candidates, master's students, and numerous independent researchers. His research is supported by substantial funding from major technology companies including Google, Meta, Amazon, Samsung, and J.P. Morgan, as well as government agencies like NSF, ONR, and AFOSR, reflecting the significance and impact of his work in physical AI and multimodal perception systems. Dr. Wu leads a dynamic research group at Stanford that collaborates extensively with the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute and Institute for Human-Centered AI. Current projects include developing neurosymbolic models for computer graphics, creating multisensory datasets like OBJECTFOLDER 2.0 for sim2real transfer in robotics, and building foundation models for embodied intelligence that can understand and manipulate objects with human-like physical intuition.
Dima Damen is a Professor of Computer Vision at the School of Computer Science, University of Bristol, where she leads the Machine Learning and Computer Vision Group. She also serves as a Senior Research Scientist at Google DeepMind. As an EPSRC Early Career Fellow (2020-2025) and a Fellow of ELLIS for Europe, her research focuses on advancing computer vision, particularly in egocentric (first-person) vision, video understanding, and action recognition. Her educational background and professional journey have positioned her as a leader in the field of computer vision, with a particular emphasis on understanding human activities from wearable cameras. She has received numerous awards including Best Paper at ACCV 2024 and Outstanding Paper at ICASSP 2021. Professor Damen's research interests span multiple areas of computer vision and machine learning. She specializes in egocentric vision, where she has made significant contributions to understanding human activities from first-person perspectives. Her work explores video understanding, action recognition, hand-object interactions, and the development of vision-language models that can interpret and generate instructions from visual data. She has pioneered approaches to unique video captioning, long video understanding through active memory representations, and spatial reasoning from egocentric videos. Her research often bridges the gap between theoretical computer vision and practical applications in human-centered AI. Her recent publications demonstrate a strong focus on egocentric vision, with papers like "AMEGO: Active Memory from long EGOcentric videos" (ECCV 2024) and "HOI-Ref: Hand-Object Interaction Referral in Egocentric Vision" (2024) advancing the state of the art in understanding long-form first-person videos. She has also contributed to vision-language models with works like "ShowHowTo: Generating Scene-Conditioned Step-by-Step Visual Instructions" (CVPR 2025) and "It's Just Another Day: Unique Video Captioning by Discriminitave Prompting" (ACCV 2024, Best Paper). Her research shows a consistent trajectory toward building systems that can understand human activities in natural environments with human-like capabilities. Professor Damen has received significant recognition for her work, including: EPSRC Early Career Fellow (2020-2025) ELLIS Fellow for Europe (Nov 2024) Best Paper at ACCV 2024 Outstanding Paper at ICASSP 2021 (awarded to only 3 out of 1700 papers) Outstanding Reviewer for CVPR 2020 and 2021 Program Chair for ICCV 2021 She has successfully advised numerous PhD students and postdoctoral researchers, many of whom have gone on to prestigious positions in academia and industry. Her group has secured significant research funding including the EPSRC Programme Grant Visual AI and the EPSRC UMPIRE grant. She actively collaborates with industry partners including Google DeepMind, Adobe, and Meta, ensuring her research has practical impact. Professor Damen leads the Machine Learning and Computer Vision Group at the University of Bristol, which focuses on egocentric vision, video understanding, and the development of vision-language models. The group has created influential datasets like EPIC-KITCHENS, which has become a standard benchmark in egocentric vision research. Her team regularly participates in and organizes workshops at major computer vision conferences including CVPR, ICCV, and ECCV.
Habib Ullah is an Associate Professor in Data Science at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU), Norway, where he conducts research at the intersection of computer vision and machine learning. He is affiliated with the Institute of Data Science under the Faculty of Science and Technology. He has previously held academic positions at COMSATS University Islamabad, Pakistan, and the University of Ha'il, Saudi Arabia, and served as a postdoctoral researcher at The Arctic University of Norway. Educational Background: PhD in Information and Communication Technology (Computer Vision), University of Trento, Italy (2011–2015) MSc in Electronics and Computer Engineering, Hanyang University, South Korea (2007–2009) BSc in Computer Systems Engineering, NWFP University of Engineering and Technology, Pakistan (2002–2006) Habib Ullah's research is primarily focused on computer vision and machine learning, with applications in aquaculture, agriculture, and human behavior analysis. He investigates underwater fish feeding sounds using audio classification, develops zero-shot learning models for recognizing unseen classes, and applies deep learning to detect stress in salmon via skin dot patterns. He also explores AI-driven controlled environment agriculture, leveraging sensors and automation for optimal crop growth. His work emphasizes practical AI solutions for real-world challenges in environmental and biological domains. The recent publications highlight a strong trend in leveraging deep learning for zero-shot and semi-supervised learning, particularly in computer vision tasks such as sea ice classification, crowd anomaly detection, and agricultural monitoring. His research spans remote sensing, biomedical signal processing, and human activity recognition, demonstrating interdisciplinary versatility. The keywords reflect a focus on robust feature representation, knowledge transfer, and model generalization. Scientific Awards and Funding: Industrial PhD grant 'Advancing Controlled Environment Agriculture AI' from The Research Council of Norway (Project number 354125, 2 million NOK, 2024) Team member (Coordinator-Participant) in the Battery Cell Assembly Twin (BatCAT) project funded by Horizon Europe (7 mEuro, 2023–2027) Development of an AI-Based Image Analysis System for Monitoring Plant Status (Funding: 1.8 mNOK, starting 2025) Habib Ullah actively supervises PhD projects and contributes to academic service through editorial and organizational roles. He has served as an Associate Editor for IEEE Access, Guest Editor for MDPI Remote Sensing, and Editor of the Springer book Machine Learning Techniques and Sensor Applications for Human Emotion, Activity Recognition, and Support (ML-SHEARS) . He has also been a Track Chair and Program Committee Member for several international conferences, reflecting his leadership in the academic community. His research is supported by significant grants and collaborative projects, indicating strong institutional and international engagement. He is involved in multiple research teams and projects, including the BatCAT project on battery manufacturing and AI applications in controlled environment agriculture with RIFT LABS AS. His lab work integrates deep learning, sensor fusion, and data analytics for environmental and biological monitoring systems.
Professor Eric Atwell is a Professor of Artificial Intelligence for Language at the University of Leeds' School of Computer Science, part of the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences. He holds additional roles as a LITE Fellow at the Leeds Institute for Teaching Excellence (40% part-time), Turing Fellow at the Alan Turing Institute, and member of the Leeds Institute for Data Analytics (LIDA) and Language at Leeds (LATL). His research focuses on AI applications in corpus linguistics, text analytics, and computational analysis of religious and medical texts, with a strong emphasis on Arabic and Islamic studies. He leads the AI4L research group and has supervised over 60 research students and fellows, many of whom have pursued careers in academia, tech, and AI-driven fields. Education: PhD in Corpus Linguistics and Language Learning (University of Leeds, 2008), BA (First Class) in Computing and Linguistics (Lancaster University, 1981) Grants: Includes EPSRC-funded projects like Natural Language Processing with Arabic and Islamic Studies (£337K, 2013-2015) and EDUBOTS chatbots for education (£94K, 2019-2022) Teaching: Leads modules in Data Mining, Text Analytics, and AI across multiple programs, including online Masters and PhDs. Known for innovative teaching approaches and student support, receiving positive feedback for engagement and course design. Research Interests: AI applied to corpus linguistics, Quranic text analysis, Arabic NLP, chatbots for education, and decolonizing curricula. Notable projects include Quranic semantic search tools, Hadith corpus analysis, and AI-driven fact-checking systems. Publications: Over 277 publications, with recent work focusing on Quranic QA systems, Arabic dialect identification, and generative AI applications in education. His research is widely cited, earning recognition from ResearchGate for high readership. Awards: Recognized for his most-read research items on ResearchGate (June 2021). Gallup StrengthsFinder highlights his top traits as Learner, Achiever, Ideation, Intellection, and Maximizer. Labs/Teams: Leads the AI4L research group and collaborates with international institutions including SUSTECH Sudan, King Saud University, and SWJT University (China). Active in research networks like LIDA and LATL.
Tianyi Zhang is a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Purdue University, part of the College of Science. He leads the Human-Centered Software Systems Lab, focusing on AI-driven systems that synergize human expertise with machine intelligence to enhance programming productivity and software reliability. Prior to Purdue, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University under Dr. Elena Glassman and earned his Ph.D. from UCLA (2019) and B.Sc. from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (2013). Education: Ph.D. in Computer Science, University of California, Los Angeles (2019) Bachelor's in Computer Science, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (2013) Research Interests: His work spans Software Engineering, Human-Computer Interaction, and AI. Key areas include program synthesis, interactive debugging tools, autonomous driving system testing, and mitigating biases in AI models. He develops systems like Interpretable Program Synthesis and SQLucid to bridge human and machine intelligence. Recent Trends in Publications: Recent work emphasizes human-in-the-loop AI, including mixed-initiative systems for data wrangling (Dango), interactive program repair, and bias analysis in text representations (STILE). He also explores challenges in autonomous driving testing and LLM-based code generation errors. Awards & Grants: NSF Career Award (2024) Amazon Research Award Showalter Trust Research Award for pre-diabetes research $1.5M NSF grant for software supply chain security Best Paper Honorable Mentions at CHI and VAHC Advising & Teams: Supervises 12+ PhD/Master's students and 30+ research interns. Notable advisees include Bonan Kou (API misuse studies) and Yuan Tian (text-to-SQL systems). Collaborates with Harvard Medical School on healthcare data analysis. Labs & Initiatives: Directs Purdue's Human-Centered Software Systems Lab. Co-founded the Societal Impact Fellows program. Active in open-source projects like Examplore for API usage visualization and JShrink for Java debloating.
Andrew Rice is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Cambridge's Department of Computer Science and Technology, and holds the Hassabis Fellowship in Computer Science. He is also the Director of Studies in Computer Science at Queens' College. His research focuses on programming languages, software engineering, and machine learning applications in software development. He leads projects like Isaac Computer Science and ALTA (Automated Language Teaching and Assessment), advancing adaptive learning technologies. His work includes static analysis tools such as Error Prone at Google, energy efficiency studies in computing infrastructure, and contributions to the Computing for the Future of the Planet initiative. His teaching emphasizes practical skill development through flipped classrooms and video lectures, earning him the 2014 Pilkington Prize for teaching excellence. He has held visiting roles at Google and collaborated on energy consumption research for mobile devices and data centers. His research spans systems, networking, and natural language processing, with a strong focus on applying computational methods to real-world challenges. Key Projects: Isaac Physics/Computer Science, ALTA, Error Prone Static Analysis Research Themes: Programming Languages, Machine Learning, Energy Efficiency Awards: Pilkington Prize (2014)
Professor Diana Inkpen is a faculty member at the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Ottawa. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto's Department of Computer Science and degrees from the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania (M.Sc. and B.Eng.). Her research focuses on computational linguistics, natural language processing (NLP), and artificial intelligence, with specialties in natural language understanding/generation, lexical semantics, and semantic web agents. Education: Ph.D., Computer Science, University of Toronto M.Sc., Computer Science and Engineering, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca B.Eng., Computer Science and Engineering, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca Affiliations: Director, NLP Lab Editor-in-Chief, Computational Intelligence journal Associate Editor, Natural Language Engineering journal Her research has led to roles such as program co-chair for AI 2012 and leadership in organizing international workshops. She has received funding from NSERC, SSHRC, and OCE, and was honored with a Visiting Professor title at the University of Wolverhampton, UK. Her teaching spans courses like Information Retrieval, Natural Language Processing, and Prolog programming. Professor Inkpen's work bridges NLP innovations with societal challenges, including mental health surveillance via social media analysis and bias mitigation in AI systems. She actively contributes to interdisciplinary projects, such as detecting hate speech and legal text entailment, while maintaining a global research network through collaborations and international conference involvement.
Emily M. Bender is the Thomas L. and Margo G. Wyckoff Endowed Professor in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Washington. She also holds adjunct appointments in the School of Computer Science and Engineering and the Information School. Her research spans multilingual grammar engineering, computational linguistics, societal impacts of language technology, and sociolinguistic variation. She directs the Computational Linguistics Laboratory (The Treehouse) and leads the CLMS program. Bender is a Fellow of the AAAS (2022) and previously served as Howard and Frances Nostrand Endowed Professor (2019–2022). She has authored influential textbooks on NLP fundamentals and pioneered work on data statements to mitigate bias in NLP systems. Her work integrates linguistic theory with computational methods, emphasizing ethical AI and language documentation. Education: PhD in Linguistics from Stanford University (advisor: Ivan A. Sag), AB in Linguistics from UC Berkeley, with studies at Tohoku University. Past roles include NAACL Executive Board Chair (2016–2017) and current roles in the Association for Computational Linguistics leadership. Her Erdős number is 4. Research focuses on the LinGO Grammar Matrix, automatic grammar inference from interlinear glossed text (AGGREGATION project), and societal implications of NLP technologies like large language models. She co-leads the RAISE initiative and contributes to labs like the Tech Policy Lab and Value Sensitive Design Lab. Over 30 advisees have completed PhD and MS degrees under her mentorship. Teaching includes courses on syntax for NLP, societal impacts of language tech, and computational linguistics. Her 2020 ACL paper on form-meaning distinctions in NLP has been influential in ethical discussions. Current projects include The AI CON (2025) on combating tech hype.
Elena Simperl is a Professor of Computer Science and Deputy Head of Department for Enterprise and Engagement at King's College London's Department of Informatics. She co-directs the King's Institute for Artificial Intelligence and serves as Director of Research for the Open Data Institute. As a Hans Fischer Senior Fellow at the Technical University of Munich's Institute for Advanced Study, she leads the Trustworthy Knowledge Graphs focus group and contributes to advancing human-centric AI research across European institutions. Professor Simperl obtained her doctoral degree in Computer Science from the Free University of Berlin and her diploma from the Technical University of Munich. Prior to joining King's, she held academic positions in Germany, Austria, and at the University of Southampton, and was a Turing Fellow. Her career trajectory demonstrates consistent leadership in bridging academic research with practical applications in data ecosystems. Her research sits at the critical intersection of AI and social computing, focusing on human-centric approaches to building sociotechnical systems that integrate data, algorithms, and human capabilities. She investigates how to make knowledge engineering more accessible, how to leverage collective intelligence for data quality improvement, and how to design participatory AI systems that address societal challenges like misinformation. Her work spans knowledge graphs, semantic technologies, crowdsourcing, and open data, with particular emphasis on the social dimensions of data-intensive systems and the governance frameworks needed for trustworthy AI deployment. Analysis of her recent publications reveals a strong evolution toward integrating large language models with traditional knowledge engineering practices while maintaining human oversight. There's a clear trajectory from foundational work on knowledge representation toward increasingly applied research addressing real-world challenges in media ecosystems, citizen science, and data governance, with growing attention to policy implications of AI technologies. Fellow of the British Computer Society Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts Hans Fischer Senior Fellow at TUM-IAS (2023) Ranked among top 100 most influential scholars in knowledge engineering of the last decade Included in Women in AI 2000 ranking Professor Simperl has led 14 major European and national research projects totaling millions in funding, including MediaFutures (a Horizon 2020 program tackling online misinformation), QROWD, ODINE, Data Pitch, and ACTION. She currently co-chairs the Croissant working group in ML Commons developing data standards for AI, and serves as president of the Semantic Web Science Association. Her research has directly influenced the development of data ecosystems supporting startups and citizen science initiatives across Europe, demonstrating exceptional ability to translate theoretical advances into practical impact. As Director of Research at the Open Data Institute, she oversees initiatives connecting data entrepreneurs with artists and civic organizations. Her leadership in the MediaFutures project established a data-driven innovation hub that supported 51 startups/SMEs and 43 artists through three open calls, creating a sustainable model for arts-technology collaborations addressing media challenges. Her work with the ODINE project helped create a European ecosystem for data-driven startups, demonstrating her commitment to building practical applications of open data principles.
Brita Wårvik is a Professor in the Department of Languages at Åbo Akademi University, affiliated with the Faculty of Humanities, Psychology and Theology. She holds a Doctor of Philosophy (Phil. Dr.) from the same institution, awarded in 2013, and has been actively contributing to linguistic research for decades. Doctor of Philosophy (Phil. Dr.), Åbo Akademi University, 2013 Her research centers on discourse analysis, pragmatics, and historical English linguistics, with a particular focus on Early Modern and Medieval English texts. She investigates discourse interaction, textual structures, and pragmatic conservatism in religious prose, often employing corpus-based and textual analysis methods. Her work bridges micro and macro perspectives in discourse, exploring how semantic units contribute to broader text worlds. Analysis of her recent publications reveals a consistent trajectory in historical discourse studies, with increasing emphasis on corpus linguistics, manuscript variation, and the evolution of discourse markers. Her editorial work, such as the 2024 volume Structures in Discourse , highlights her leadership in synthesizing interdisciplinary perspectives on language use. Scientific Awards: Teacher of the Year (2001) ÅAU Student Union's Rose (2007) Brita Wårvik actively supervises and mentors academic visitors and collaborators, as seen in her hosting of scholars like Carmen Lee and Lieselotte Anderwald. She is the coordinator of the ongoing Project ICLE (International Corpus of Learner English) , securing research continuity and international collaboration. Her involvement in organizing workshops, such as the ICLE+30 FI-subcorpus Workshop in 2024, underscores her role in fostering academic exchange. In terms of research infrastructure, she is deeply embedded in the ICLE network, contributing to the development of learner language corpora. Her activities reflect strong international collaborations, particularly in the fields of historical linguistics and discourse studies, with a visible presence in both research and academic community-building.
Cezary Kaliszyk is a Professor in Theoretical Computer Science at the University of Melbourne, previously affiliated with the University of Innsbruck. He is actively involved in research and leadership in formal methods, automated reasoning, and machine learning for theorem proving. Research Interests: Automated Reasoning and Interactive Theorem Proving Formalized Mathematics and Proof Automation Machine Learning for Logic and Theorem Proving Integration of AI with Proof Assistants (Coq, Isabelle) Dependent Type Theory and Higher-Order Logic His recent publications (2023–2025) span topics in dependently-typed logic, learning for proof guidance, formalization of surreal numbers, and blockchain-based formal methods. The works consistently bridge formal logic with machine learning, emphasizing automation, explainability, and cross-system integration. Scientific Leadership and Projects: Principal Investigator, ERC project FormalWeb3 Lead Developer, CoqHammer , Tactician , ProofWeb WG5 Leader, COST Action EuroProofNet (until 2024) Contributor to HOL(y)Hammer , Isabelle Enigma He supervises multiple PhD students and has mentored several graduates in formal methods and AI. He teaches courses in theoretical computer science, logic, and machine learning. There are no listed awards in the provided data, but his extensive publication record and project leadership indicate significant recognition in the field. Labs and Research Groups: He leads a research group focused on formal methods and learning-based reasoning, collaborating internationally on projects involving proof automation, formal libraries, and semantic technologies.
Yangruibo Ding is an incoming Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and currently serves as a Postdoctoral Scientist at AWS Agentic AI. He has held significant research positions at Google DeepMind, Amazon AWS AI Labs, and IBM Research, establishing himself as a leading researcher in software engineering with a focus on large language models for code. His research focuses on developing large language models (LLMs) and agentic systems for software engineering. He specializes in training LLMs with advanced symbolic reasoning capabilities for debugging, testing, program analysis, and verification. His work aims to build efficient, collaborative agentic systems for complex software development and maintenance tasks, with particular emphasis on code generation, vulnerability detection, and execution-aware pre-training techniques. Dr. Ding's publication record reveals a strong trajectory toward enhancing code intelligence through comprehensive semantics reasoning and self-refinement approaches. His research spans multiple dimensions of software engineering including code completion, vulnerability detection, model evaluation, and cross-file context understanding, with applications across various programming languages and development environments. Dr. Ding has received numerous prestigious awards recognizing his contributions to the field: IBM Ph.D. Fellowship Award (2022-2024) ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award (2023) IEEE TSE Best Paper Award Runner-up (2022) Ph.D. Service Award, Columbia CS (2025) NSF Student Travel Award for ESEC/FSE'23 (2023) ACM SIGSOFT CAPS Travel Grant (2023) NSF Travel Award for ICSE'22 (2022) As he establishes his research group at UCLA, Dr. Ding is actively seeking students with strong coding skills and experience in large language models, program analysis, verification, or security. He serves on program committees for major conferences including ICSE (2026), ASE (2024, 2025), and ESEC/FSE Artifacts Track (2023), and regularly reviews for top-tier conferences and journals in AI and software engineering. His research is conducted through collaborations with leading industry teams including AWS Agentic AI, Google DeepMind's Learning4Code team, and IBM Research's AI for Code team, creating a robust network of industry-academia partnerships that drive innovation in software engineering research.
Tim Van de Cruys is a Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Arts, KU Leuven, serving as Head of the Centre for Computational Linguistics (CCL). He maintains significant affiliations with LECTIO (KU Leuven Institute for the Study of the Transmission of Texts, Ideas and Images), Leuven.AI (KU Leuven Institute for Artificial Intelligence), and LILI (KU Leuven Interdisciplinary Language Institute). His work bridges computational linguistics, artificial intelligence, and humanities research with practical applications across multiple disciplines. Dr. Van de Cruys specializes in computational semantics and creative language generation, with particular expertise in applying NLP techniques to historical and classical texts. His research spans multiple domains including: Natural Language Processing for ancient languages (Latin, Ancient Greek) Computational approaches to lexical and compositional semantics Large language models and their applications in humanities research Creative language generation and human-AI collaboration Named entity recognition and disambiguation in historical contexts Non-autoregressive modeling for sequential generation tasks His recent publications demonstrate a strong focus on applying cutting-edge NLP techniques to humanities challenges, particularly in processing ancient languages. He frequently employs transformer models to address named entity recognition, word sense discrimination, and semantic analysis in low-resource language contexts. His work consistently bridges formal linguistic theory with practical computational applications, creating valuable tools for digital humanities scholars. As promotor and co-promotor on numerous research projects extending through 2029, Dr. Van de Cruys supervises PhD students working at the AI-humanities intersection. His current major projects include "Living Corpora" (exploring human-AI collaboration in digital humanities), "Stochastic processes and non-autoregressive models for sequential generation," and "NIKAW" (exploring knowledge networks from classical antiquity). These projects demonstrate his commitment to advancing both theoretical understanding and practical applications of computational linguistics. He teaches various courses including Computational Linguistics, Scripting Languages, Programming for Humanities, Computational Creativity, and AI for Humanities, training students to work at this critical interdisciplinary crossroads. His leadership of the Centre for Computational Linguistics positions him at the forefront of computational linguistics research in Belgium, where he continues to expand the boundaries of what's possible at the intersection of language, computation, and humanistic inquiry.
Prof. Alexander Pretschner is a Professor of Software & Systems Engineering at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and Founding Director of the Bavarian Research Institute for Digital Transformation (bidt). He also serves as Scientific Director of fortiss, a Bavarian research institute for software-intensive systems. His research focuses on software engineering, testing, information security, and ethical software development. Pretschner holds a PhD from TUM and has held academic positions at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and TU Kaiserslautern. He is a co-editor of several prestigious journals, including IEEE Transactions on Reliability and the Journal of Software Testing, Verification and Reliability. Education: PhD in Computer Science, Technical University of Munich MSc in Computer Science, University of Kansas (on Fulbright Scholarship) Diplom in Computer Science, RWTH Aachen University Research Interests: His work spans testing methodologies, secure software design, and ethical considerations in agile development. Notable contributions include frameworks for metamorphic testing, distributed data usage control, and accountability mechanisms for cyber-physical systems. Awards: IBM Faculty Award (2012, 2013) Google Focused Research Award (2011, 2012) EARTO Innovation Prize (2014) 2nd Platz Supervisory Award (2020) Advising & Grants: Pretschner has supervised numerous PhD and Master’s students, contributing to over 200 publications. He leads projects like EDAP (Ethical Deliberation in Agile Processes) and collaborates with industry partners on cybersecurity and AI ethics initiatives. Labs & Teams: His work is anchored in bidt, fortiss, and TUM’s Chair of Software & Systems Engineering, focusing on societal impacts of digitalization and trustworthy AI systems.