Mary Ann Tan

Mary Ann Tan is a PhD student and Junior Researcher at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and FIZ Karlsruhe – Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure, working within the Information Service Engineering group and the Institute of Applied Informatics and Formal Description Methods (AIFB).

Her academic background includes:

• PhD candidate at KIT/FIZ Karlsruhe (2020–present)
• MSc in Computational Linguistics, Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich (2018–2020)
• MSc in Computer Science (NLP specialization), De La Salle University, Manila (2002–2004)
• BSc in Computer Science, De La Salle University, Manila (1997–2001)

Tan's research integrates Natural Language Processing, Knowledge Graphs, and Deep Learning to solve challenges in Cultural Heritage digitization. She develops methods for cross-lingual embeddings, knowledge graph refinement, multimodal search, and transformer-based workflows – transforming legacy cultural data into structured, AI-processable formats. Her work bridges technical AI innovation with practical heritage preservation needs, emphasizing under-resourced languages and multimodal cultural artifacts.

Her 11 publications (2021-2025) reveal a cohesive trajectory: starting with bibliographic knowledge graphs (2021), advancing to multimodal art search and audio ontologies (2022-2023), and recently focusing on LLM integration for cultural data and mathematical semantics (2024-2025). This progression demonstrates increasing technical sophistication while maintaining consistent application to cultural heritage challenges.

As an active collaborator in large international projects (e.g., the 50+ author Semantic Web and Creative AI report), Tan contributes to team-based research while developing her independent expertise. Her industry experience in software engineering informs her practical approach to research implementation within the Information Service Engineering group.