Professor Ihab Ilyas is a leading figure in data management and machine learning at the Cheriton School of Computer Science , University of Waterloo , where he holds the Thomson Reuters Research Chair in Data Quality . He is currently on leave from the university, serving as a Distinguished Engineer, Proactive Intelligence at Apple Inc . His research focuses on data cleaning , large-scale data integration , knowledge graphs , and machine learning applications in data quality . He has pioneered systems like HoloClean and Saga , with commercial impacts through co-founded startups Inductiv (acquired by Apple) and Tamr . PhD in Computer Science from Purdue University Co-founder of Inductiv (acquired by Apple) Co-founder of Tamr Research Interests include: Probabilistic and uncertain data management Machine learning for data quality and enrichment Big data systems and information extraction Knowledge graph construction and optimization Scientific Awards and Recognitions include: Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (2024) C.C. Gotlieb Computer Award (2024) IEEE Fellow (2021) ACM Fellow (2020) Cheriton Faculty Fellowship (2013-2016) Ontario Early Researcher Award
William Yang Wang serves as the Mellichamp Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of California, Santa Barbara (2019-present). He directs the UCSB Center for Responsible Machine Learning, the Mind and Machine Intelligence Initiative, and the UCSB NLP Group. His research focuses on theoretical foundations and practical algorithms for AI, particularly in NLP, LLMs, and neuro-symbolic reasoning. PhD in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University Active in AI theory and applications (2016-present) Research interests span multiple AI domains, with special emphasis on NLP and responsible machine learning. He has pioneered datasets like HybridQA, TabFact, and VaTeX, enabling advancements in multi-hop QA, fact verification, and video-language tasks. His work combines statistical relational learning with modern deep learning paradigms. Recent publications center around multimodal reasoning, knowledge graph integration, and responsible AI development. He has received numerous accolades including the IEEE SPS Pierre-Simon Laplace Award (2024) and NSF CAREER Award (2021). Karen Sparck Jones Award (2022) DARPA Young Faculty Award (2018) IBM Faculty Award Mentoring 15+ PhD and postdoc researchers who now hold positions at Microsoft Research, Amazon, Meta GenAI, and academic institutions like Arizona and Rutgers. His lab maintains active collaborations with industry partners through initiatives like ChipAgents.ai, which he founded as CEO.
Song Kim is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a Faculty Affiliate at the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society (IDSS). He holds a Ph.D. in Politics from Princeton University, where he was awarded the Harold W. Dodds Fellowship (2012-2013). His research focuses on International Political Economy, Formal and Quantitative Methodology, and Big Data analysis of international trade. He is particularly known for his work on firm-level political incentives in trade liberalization, which earned him the 2015 Mancur Olson Award and the 2018 Michael Wallerstein Award for best published article in political economy. Kim develops computational methods for analyzing trade data, including dimension reduction and visualization techniques. He maintains two key databases: LobbyView (tracking firm lobbying efforts) and TradeLab (for trade policy analysis). His research has been published in top journals such as the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, and International Organization. Educations : Ph.D. in Politics (Princeton University), B.A. not explicitly stated. His research interests include the dynamical evolution of lobbying networks, strategic links between political donations and lobbying, and the political origins of trade regulations. He also contributes methodological innovations, such as two-way fixed effects models and matching methods for causal inference with panel data. Awards : Mancur Olson Award (2015) Michael Wallerstein Award (2018) Harold W. Dodds Fellowship (2012-2013) Advising & Grants : No listed advisees. His work is supported by MIT’s IDSS and institutional funding. He collaborates on software tools like the 'wfe' and 'concordance' R packages, advancing computational social science. Labs/Teams : Associated with MIT’s Political Science Department and IDSS, focusing on interdisciplinary projects in trade, lobbying, and quantitative methods.
Margaret E. Roberts is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, San Diego. She co-directs the China Data Lab at the 21st Century China Center and serves as an affiliate at the UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. Her academic appointments reflect her interdisciplinary approach combining political science, statistics, and computational methods. University of California, San Diego, Department of Political Science (Current) Co-director, China Data Lab at the 21st Century China Center Affiliate, UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation Roberts earned her PhD in Government from Harvard University (2014), MS in Statistics from Stanford University (2009), and BA in International Relations and Economics from Stanford University (2009). Her educational background bridges political science, statistics, and computational methods, forming the foundation for her interdisciplinary research approach. Professor Roberts' research focuses on the intersection of political methodology and the politics of information, with specific expertise in automated content analysis and the politics of censorship and propaganda in China. Her work employs innovative methods including social media analysis, online experiments, and large-scale text analysis to understand how censorship and propaganda influence information access and political beliefs. She has made significant contributions to text-as-data methodologies, developing tools like the Structural Topic Model (stm) R package that have become widely used in social science research. Roberts' research portfolio demonstrates consistent focus on authoritarian information control, particularly in China, while expanding into broader applications of text analysis in political science. Her publications span top journals in political science, computer science, and interdisciplinary fields, reflecting the cross-disciplinary nature of her work. Goldsmith Book Award Best Book Award in the Human Rights Section Best Book Award in Information Technology and Politics Section Best Book Award of the last decade in the Political Communication Section of the American Political Science Association Chancellor's Associates Endowed Chair at UCSD Foreign Affairs Best Books of 2018 Professor Roberts has secured significant research funding supporting her work on Chinese censorship, propaganda, and text analysis methodologies. Her research has practical applications for understanding digital authoritarianism, content moderation, and the development of computational tools for social science research. She has mentored numerous students and collaborators, contributing to the next generation of scholars working at the intersection of political science and computational methods. Roberts also leads the China Data Lab, which serves as a hub for research on Chinese politics and society using digital methods.
LEE Wee Sun is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the National University of Singapore (NUS), where he previously served as Head of Department, Vice Dean of Undergraduate Studies, and Vice Dean of Research. His academic journey began with a B.Eng. in Computer Systems Engineering from the University of Queensland (1992) and a Ph.D. from the Australian National University (1996), followed by research roles at the Australian Defence Force Academy and MIT. Education: Ph.D., Australian National University, Canberra, Australia (1996) B.Eng. in Computer Systems Engineering, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia (1992) Research Focus: Professor Lee pioneers work in Machine Learning , Planning Under Uncertainty , and Approximate Inference , with emphasis on integrating AI subfields for holistic reasoning. His current projects include "Learning to Decompose for Reasoning and Planning" (enhancing LLMs via self-supervised problem decomposition) and "Learning to Reason with Visual-Linguistic Inputs" (unifying vision, language, and reasoning in single architectures). Publication Trends: Recent work (2023-2025) centers on bridging LLMs with classical AI techniques, featuring breakthroughs in uncertainty quantification, multi-task optimization, and graph-based reasoning. Key themes include sparsity-aware vehicle routing, epistemic uncertainty for reliable LLMs, and differentiable neural solvers for combinatorial problems. Awards: IJCAI-JAIR Best Paper Prize (2022) RSS Test of Time Award (2021) RoboCup Best Paper Award (IROS 2015) HRATC 1st Place (2015) IPPC POMDP Track 1st Place (2011, 2014) UAI Google Best Student Paper (2014) Semeval-1 1st/2nd Place (2007) J.G. Crawford Prize (ANU 1996) Leadership & Service: As steering committee chair for ACML and area chair for NeurIPS/ICML/AAAI/IJCAI, Professor Lee shapes global AI discourse. His administrative roles at NUS and collaborations with MIT/Singapore-MIT Alliance demonstrate commitment to advancing AI education and research infrastructure. While student advisees aren't listed, his leadership positions imply extensive mentoring. Research Ecosystem: His work drives NUS's AI initiatives including Knowledge@Computing projects on reasoning frontiers. Current efforts focus on making AI systems robust through uncertainty-aware planning and multi-modal integration, with applications in robotics, verification systems, and combinatorial optimization.
Brandon M. Stewart is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Princeton University with extensive interdisciplinary affiliations. He serves as Director of the Statistics Core at the Office of Population Research and maintains formal connections with the Politics Department, Princeton Institute for Computational Science and Engineering, Center for Information Technology Policy, and Center for the Digital Humanities. Stewart holds editorial leadership as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Political Analysis and Associate Editor at Sociological Methods & Research . His educational background includes: Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University (2015) Master's degree in Statistics from Harvard University (2014) Stewart's research pioneers innovative quantitative methods for social science applications, specializing in automated text analysis and modeling complex heterogeneity in regression. His methodological frameworks enable researchers to uncover hidden structures in large datasets that were previously too costly or impossible to analyze. While his recent work has focused on using newspaper archives to study propaganda mechanisms in contemporary China, his tools are deliberately designed for broad applicability across diverse domains including education, human trafficking, forced migration, international relations, constitutional law, and psychology. His publication record demonstrates consistent innovation at the intersection of statistics, machine learning, and social inquiry. Stewart's work shows a clear trajectory from foundational methodological development to practical implementation across numerous substantive areas, with recurring themes of enhancing causal inference with textual data, developing robust topic modeling techniques, and creating accessible computational tools for social scientists. Stewart's scholarly excellence has been recognized through multiple prestigious awards: 2024 Leo Goodman (Early Career) Award from the Methodology Section of the American Sociological Association 2023 Emerging Scholar Award from the Political Methodology Society Edward R Chase Dissertation Prize Gosnell Prize for Excellence in Political Methodology Political Analysis Editor's Choice Award Recognition for Excellence in Mentoring Graduate Students As a mentor, Stewart has guided several successful graduate students to faculty positions at institutions including UCLA and Georgetown. His collaborative approach is evident in numerous multi-author projects spanning disciplines from political science to computational linguistics. His leadership extends to the Sociology Statistics Reading Group, which he founded to foster interdisciplinary methodological exchange, and his summer methods camp that trains social scientists in advanced quantitative techniques.
Zohreh Sharafi is an Assistant Professor of Software Engineering in the Department of Computer and Software Engineering (GIGL) at Polytechnique Montréal. Previously, she served as a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where she worked with Dr. Westley Weimer and was awarded the prestigious NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship. Prior to her academic career, she worked as a software engineer at Morgan Stanley, contributing to the firm's electronic trading platform and serving as principal architect of SURF, a market data simulator. Her educational background includes a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from École polytechnique de Montréal under the supervision of Dr. Giuliano Antoniol and Dr. Yann-Gaël Guéhéneuc, a Master of Applied Science in Software Engineering from Concordia University, and a Bachelor of Computer Engineering from the University of Tehran. Dr. Sharafi leads the SENSE Lab, a multidisciplinary software engineering research laboratory focused on understanding problem-solving strategies developers use during software development, with particular attention to human factors such as gender and native language. Her research combines human-centric design with experimental methodologies, investigating cognitive processes involved in software development using biometric measures including eye tracking and neuroimaging. Current active projects include evaluating trustworthiness perceptions of software artifacts and studying the role of creativity in software engineering tasks. She has made significant contributions to understanding how gender influences program comprehension and code review processes. Her publication record demonstrates a strong focus on empirical methods in software engineering, particularly eye tracking and neuroimaging techniques to study developer cognition. Her work spans program comprehension, code review, requirements engineering, and the impact of human factors on software development processes. She has developed methodological frameworks for conducting eye tracking studies in software engineering and has made notable contributions to understanding how visualization techniques affect software development tasks. NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship NSERC Discovery Grant Program and Launch Supplements (Sep 2024-Sep 2029) IVADO Startup & Operation Fund (Jan 2022-Jan 2023) Scholarship for Doctoral Studies from Fonds de Recherche du Quebec Distinguished Reviewer Awards from IEEE ICPC 2020 and ACM FSE 2024 Dr. Sharafi actively mentors students including Mahta Amini (PhD Candidate, IVADO Scientifique en résidence 2024 Laureate), Cameron Cherif (PhD Candidate), Sara Yabesi (Master's Student), and Anthonia Njoku (Graduate research intern). She serves on numerous conference organizing committees including as Local Arrangement Chair for SANER 2025, Program Co-chair for SEMLA 2024, and as a reviewer for top-tier journals including IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering and ACM Computing Surveys. Her research is supported by multiple grants focused on understanding human factors in software engineering through empirical methods. At Polytechnique Montréal, Dr. Sharafi directs the SENSE Lab which brings together computer scientists, cognitive scientists, and software engineering researchers to investigate the cognitive aspects of software development. The lab employs advanced methodologies including eye tracking, functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study how developers comprehend, navigate, and modify software systems. Current projects examine trustworthiness perceptions in code review, the role of creativity in software engineering tasks, and gender differences in software development processes.
Dr Estara Arrant is a Cambridge University Library Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellow and Trinity Hall Postdoctoral Research Associate. She merges Semitic linguistics with data science to study medieval Jewish and Islamic textual cultures. PhD (University of Cambridge, 2021): Computational analysis of Cairo Genizah Torah codices MPhil (University of Oxford, 2018): Linguistic structure of Qur’ānic creation narratives BA: History & Modern Hebrew Her groundbreaking work combines machine learning and bioinformatics algorithms to analyze textual evolution. Current projects include: Developing the first NLP model for medieval Judaeo-Arabic Creating digital tools for computerized stemmatology She actively teaches Python and R as an Cambridge Digital Humanities associate, and her research has been published by Open Book Publishers and Brill .
Xinjie (Cynthia) Ma is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Accounting at the University of Iowa's Tippie College of Business. Previously, she held a Visiting Assistant Professor position at the University of Iowa in 2025. Her research bridges financial accounting with advanced technologies, focusing on corporate disclosure mechanisms, human capital valuation, and AI/NLP applications in capital markets. She earned her PhD in Accounting from Temple University in 2021. Research Expertise : Financial accounting, CSR strategy alignment, human capital analytics, and machine learning applications Publications : 2023 Review of Accounting Studies paper on CSR-performance alignment, 2022 The Accounting Review article on text-based investment opportunity sets Teaching : Instructed graduate Financial Statement Analysis at National University of Singapore (2021-2025), undergraduate Managerial Accounting at Temple University (2019) Academic Affiliation : Tippie College of Business Her recent work analyzes how textual disclosures in 10-K filings inform investment decisions and explores labor demand dynamics through real-time market data. Currently, she's developing machine learning models to predict startup innovation potential and examining managerial communication patterns in earnings calls. Email: xinjie-ma@uiowa.edu
Leland Bybee is an Assistant Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business . He leverages machine learning and natural language processing to address economic and financial questions, particularly focusing on belief measurement with applications to asset pricing and behavioral economics. Ph.D. in Financial Economics, Yale School of Management (2024) M.S. in Statistics, University of Michigan (2017) B.A. in Economics, University of Chicago (2013) His research integrates computational methods with economic theory to analyze: Textual analysis of business news for macroeconomic tracking Narrative-driven asset pricing models Memory-based belief formation using kernel methods Macroeconomic determinants of currency returns He has received multiple awards including: Dimension Fund Advisors Distinguished Paper Award BlackRock Applied Research Award HEC Top Finance Graduate Award The Brattle Group PhD Candidates Award EFA Engelbert Dockner Memorial Prize Bybee teaches Machine Learning in Finance and participates in finance seminars, contributing computational tools like regIPCA (Python) and changepointsHD (R) to the research community.
Dr. Haiyan Liu is an Associate Professor of Quantitative Methods, Measurement, and Statistics in the Department of Psychological Sciences at the University of California, Merced, within the School of Social Sciences, Humanities, and Arts. She earned her Ph.D. in Quantitative Psychology from the University of Notre Dame (2018). Her research focuses on advanced statistical modeling of psychological and educational data, including high-dimensional, longitudinal, and social network data. She develops Bayesian methodologies and machine learning techniques to enhance understanding of human behavior, with recent emphasis on structural equation modeling, network dynamics, and nonparametric growth curves. Her work addresses challenges in survey methodology and behavioral data analysis. Dr. Liu’s educational background includes a Ph.D. in Quantitative Psychology from the University of Notre Dame (2018), complementing her current academic role. Her lab, accessible at https://sites.google.com/view/ucmhaiyanliu , supports her research activities. Her research interests span Bayesian SEM, social network analysis, and applications of machine learning to behavioral data, aiming to bridge methodological innovation with practical psychological inquiry. Her recent articles highlight advancements in Bayesian model selection, longitudinal sentiment analysis, and social network mediation. She emphasizes prior specification rigor in Bayesian frameworks and explores nonlinear relationships in social dynamics. Though no awards are explicitly listed, her contributions to statistical methodologies in psychological research reflect significant scholarly impact. Dr. Liu advises students in quantitative methods and has developed software tools like logistic4p for misclassification correction in logistic regression. Her work integrates computational methods with theoretical advancements, positioning her as a key contributor to modern quantitative psychology.
Maria K. E. Lahman is a Professor in the Department of Applied Statistics and Research Methods within the College of Education and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Northern Colorado. She holds a Ph.D. in Child Development from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (2001) and serves as Co-Chair of the Institutional Research Board at UNC. Her academic work bridges qualitative methodology with ethical research practices and creative representation. Dr. Lahman's research focuses on culturally responsive qualitative research, research ethics, early childhood education, and the aesthetic representation of research through poetry and other creative forms. Her scholarship addresses creating ethical solutions for culturally complex methodological situations, diversity issues, young children, mothering experiences, and qualitative writing representation. As a Mennonite, she integrates social justice and peacebuilding into her pedagogy and scholarship. Her recent publications show a clear trajectory toward innovative research representation, with a particular emphasis on research poetry and culturally responsive methodologies. The 15 most recent articles reveal a consistent focus on ethical research practices, creative representation forms, and culturally responsive approaches to qualitative inquiry, with increasing attention to poetry as a legitimate research method and representation form. Outstanding Advisor Award, College of Education and Behavioral Sciences, UNC (2008-2009) Outstanding Scholar Award, College of Education and Behavioral Sciences, UNC (2007-2008) Service Provider Award, University of Northern CO (2006-2007) Outstanding Teacher Award, College of Education, UNC (2002-2003) Dr. Lahman has advised numerous graduate students in qualitative methodology and has been recognized for her exceptional mentorship. Her research program has generated multiple textbooks including Ethics in Social Science Research: Becoming Culturally Responsive (2017) and Writing and Representing Qualitative Research (2021), which have become influential resources in the field. She maintains an active research agenda focused on advancing ethical research with diverse groups and developing innovative methods for representing qualitative findings. Her work centers around creating spaces for culturally responsive research practices, with particular attention to vulnerable populations and ethical dilemmas in fieldwork. Dr. Lahman's scholarship challenges traditional research boundaries through her exploration of research poetry and other aesthetic forms of representation that maintain academic rigor while embracing creative expression.
Stefania Degaetano-Ortlieb is an Associate Professor of English Linguistics and Corpus Linguistics at Saarland University's Department of Language Science and Technology. She serves as Principal Investigator for the Collaborative Research Center (SFB 1102) 'Information Density and Linguistic Encoding,' leading Project B1 on diachronic information density in English scientific writing (17th century-present). Her interdisciplinary work bridges computational methods with sociolinguistics, focusing on register variation, language change, and digital humanities. Research interests center on text mining, data analytics, and probabilistic modeling of language variation. Key areas include: Diachronic evolution of scientific registers and linguistic densification Information-theoretic approaches to language efficiency Computational sociolinguistics and register diversification AI applications in humanities education (e.g., ChatGPT integration) Her publications show a strong trend toward quantitative diachronic analysis, with recent work emphasizing: interpretable AI models for linguistic change detection; propagandistic narrative analysis in conflict zones; and multi-word expression dynamics in scientific discourse. Cross-disciplinary collaborations frequently intersect with history, psychology, and media studies. Awards include the Fellowship Excellence Program for Young Female Scientists (2015-2018). Current grants: EU Horizon MSCA Doctoral Network 'CASCADE' (€521K to UdS, 2024-2027) Data-Pin Project for AI in education (€50K, 2023-2024) SFB 1102 Project B1 (€595K, 2022-2026) Advises PhD candidates in the EU CASCADE project on computational semantic change. Leads a research team exploring Russian media narratives, personality modeling in LLMs, and multi-word expressions. Directs teaching modules integrating AI tools for humanities students.
George Kesidis is a Professor in Computer Science and Engineering and Electrical Engineering at Penn State University. His research spans deep learning security, virtual reality optimization, and cloud computing. College of Engineering (Penn State University) Research Focus: Backdoor Attacks, DNN Robustness, Edge Caching Active in NSF and U.S. Navy-funded projects (2022-2026) His work addresses backdoor data poisoning , test-time evasion attacks , and DNN overfitting mitigation . He develops techniques like activation clipping, perturbation analysis, and statistical defense models. Recent projects include edge caching systems for VR and security-driven AI frameworks. Key article trends reveal expertise in adversarial deep learning, immersive media delivery, and cloud resource optimization. Current grants focus on multi-user VR, GPU scheduling, and serverless-cloud hybrid architectures. He collaborates extensively with researchers like David J. Miller and Xinyu Li, particularly on cloud-based adversarial defense mechanisms and VR streaming benchmarks.
Kenneth BENOIT is the Dean and Full-time Professor of Computational Social Science at the School of Social Sciences, Singapore Management University (SMU). Previously, he served as Director of the Data Science Institute at the London School of Economics (LSE) from 2020 to 2024. He holds a PhD in Government from Harvard University, specializing in statistical methodology. His research focuses on computational methods for analyzing textual data, particularly political texts and social media. Key areas include text-as-data techniques, natural language processing, and the application of large language models in social sciences. He has pioneered methods combining machine learning with crowd-sourced coding to improve the accuracy of political text analysis. Ken’s work emphasizes the analysis of big data, electoral systems, and comparative party competition, with notable contributions to the European Parliament and policy positioning studies. His expertise extends to software development, including R packages like quanteda and spacyr , which are widely used in text analysis. His articles and publications span methodological innovations, policy analysis, and interdisciplinary applications. Notable projects include scaling political party positions and examining the role of AI in public policy. He is actively involved in academic leadership, having served on editorial boards and organized collaborative research initiatives like the CIVICA research hackathon. Beyond SMU, he maintains professional profiles on LinkedIn and GitHub , reflecting his commitment to open-source tools and scholarly collaboration.
