Diana Maynard

Dr. Diana Maynard is a Senior Research Fellow and Deputy Head of the Natural Language Processing (NLP) research group at the University of Sheffield's School of Computer Science. She leads computational linguistics efforts in the GATE research team, focusing on NLP tools and semantic analysis. Her work spans social media analytics, misinformation detection, and ontology development. She has held key roles in EU-funded projects like KNOWMAK and RISIS2, advancing research-policy linkages and social media analysis frameworks.

Education and affiliations include extensive NLP research with a focus on GATE tool development, collaborations with organizations like the Centre for Freedom of the Media, and advisory roles in digital policy projects. Research interests emphasize applying NLP to address societal challenges like media freedom, environmental sustainability, and political discourse analysis. She has supervised numerous PhD students and delivered training courses on sentiment analysis and GATE.

Her research output includes over 150 peer-reviewed publications, with recent focus on multimodal fake news detection, online abuse datasets, and climate change communication. She has secured £4M+ in research grants, including projects addressing journalist safety and environmental policy analysis. Her work bridges academic NLP with real-world applications in media monitoring, crisis response, and policy-making.

Grants include leadership in EU Horizon2020 initiatives and UK research councils, emphasizing interdisciplinary NLP applications. She actively engages in public speaking and policy advisory roles, promoting the societal impact of NLP technologies.