Yi Ma

Yi Ma is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Hong Kong (HKU), serving as Chair of Artificial Intelligence and Director of HKU's School of Computing and Data Science (HKU CDS) and the Musketeers Foundation Institute of Data Science (HKU IDS). He holds a joint faculty position in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at UC Berkeley. His academic journey includes roles at UIUC (2000-2011), Microsoft Research Asia (2009-2014), and ShanghaiTech University (2014-2017). He earned his PhD from UC Berkeley in 2000, with earlier degrees from Tsinghua University.

Research focuses on computer vision, high-dimensional data analysis, and intelligent systems, with contributions to robust face recognition, sparse representation, and deep learning principles. Key publications include works on ReduNet, low-dimensional models, and generalized PCA. He has been Program Chair for ICCV 2013 and General Chair for ICCV 2015.

Recent activities include keynote speeches at international conferences (e.g., Future Science Prize Symposium 2024, PRCV 2024) and leadership in initiatives like the Conference on Parsimony and Learning (CPAL 2024). Awards include IEEE, ACM, and SIAM Fellowships, along with best paper and Marr prizes.

• Education:
  • Bachelor’s in Automation and Applied Mathematics, Tsinghua University (1995)
  • Master’s in EECS and Mathematics, Tsinghua University (1997)
  • PhD in EECS, UC Berkeley (2000)
• Awards:
  • NSF Career Award (2004)
  • ONR Young Investigator Award (2005)
  • David Marr Prize (ICCV 1999)
  • IEEE/ACM/SIAM Fellowships
• Labs & Initiatives:
  • HKU IDS and CDS
  • Berkeley Artificial Intelligence Research (BAIR)