Artificial Intelligence

Duke University

Cynthia Rudin is an Associate Professor of computer science, electrical and computer engineering, and statistics at Duke University. She is also an associate director of the Statistical and Applied Mathematical Sciences Institute (SAMSI). Previously, Professor Rudin held positions at MIT, Columbia, and NYU. Her current interests lie in machine learning, data mining, applied statistics, and knowledge discovery. Her research focuses on machine learning tools that help humans make better decisions, mainly interpretable machine learning.

She holds an undergraduate degree from the University at Buffalo, and a Ph.D. in applied and computational mathematics from Princeton University. She is a three-time winner of the INFORMS Innovative Applications in Analytics Award, was named as one of the “Top 40 Under 40” by Poets and Quants in 2015 and was named by Businessinsider.com as one of the 12 most impressive professors at MIT in 2015. She is also a past chair of both the INFORMS Data Mining Section and the Statistical Learning and Data Science section of the American Statistical Association.

Highlights

• Areas of Expertise: Artificial intelligence, Statistics, Computer engineering, Decision-making, Machine learning
• Named a "Top 40 under 40" by Poets and Quants in 2015

Consortium for Robotics and Unmanned Systems Education and Research (CRUSER)

Jeffrey E. Kline is a retired Captain of the United States Navy. Jeff Kline attended the University of Missouri, School of Engineering, graduating with honors in Industrial Engineering.

He is currently a Professor of Practice in the Operations Research department and Program Director for the Consortium for Robotics and Unmanned Systems Education and Research (CRUSER). He teaches Joint Campaign Analysis, systems analysis, executive risk assessment and contributes to maritime security education programs offered at NPS. Kline supports applied analytical research in naval warfare, maritime operations and security, theater ballistic missile defense, and future force composition studies. Additionally, Jeff is an Adjunct Professor at the Naval War College teaching an analytical series titled Joint Analysis for the Warfare Commander.

He has received several NPS faculty awards including the Superior Civilian Service Award, 2011 Institute for Operations Research and Management Science (INFORMS) Award for Teaching of OR Practice, 2009 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Homeland Security Award, 2007 Hamming Award for interdisciplinary research, 2007 Wayne E. Meyers Award for Excellence in Systems Engineering Research, and the 2005 Northrop Grumman Award for Excellence in Systems Engineering.

Highlights

• Areas of Expertise: Artificial intelligence, Risk assessment, Maritime security
• Veteran, United States Navy

Army Cyber Institute, United States Military Academy

Nathaniel D. Bastian is a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army, where he serves as Chief Data Scientist and Senior Research Scientist at the Army Cyber Institute (ACI), as well as Academy Professor of Operations Research and Data Science with a dual faculty appointment in the Department of Systems Engineering and the Department of Mathematical Sciences within the United States Military Academy (USMA) at West Point. LTC Bastian leads the ACI's Data and Decision Sciences Division while overseeing the ACI's infrastructure, platform, tooling and pipelines for data engineering and management, advanced analytics, algorithm and model development, modeling and simulation, and testing and evaluation. He directs the ACI's Intelligent Cyber-Systems and Analytics Research Lab and the ACI's Internet of Things Research Lab, as well as co-directs the ACI's Cyber Modeling and Simulation Research Lab. As Principal Investigator and Technical Program Manager, his basic and applied research and development portfolio, in collaboration with Government, Academia, Industry, FFRDC, UARC and National Lab partners, aims to advance the body of knowledge in operations research, data science, artificial intelligence, machine learning, statistics, scientific computing, applied mathematics, and cognitive science to support the cyberspace domain for stakeholders across the Army, other Services, Department of Defense (DoD), Intelligence Community (IC), and Nation. He has co-authored over 80 refereed journal and conference papers, six book chapters, and one textbook. He is the recipient of numerous academic awards and honors, to include a Fulbright Scholarship and National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, and he has received $4M+ in externally-funded research monies from multiple government organizations (DARPA, OUSD, NSA, DEVCOM, AFRL, etc.). Prior to his current role, LTC Bastian served as the Chief Artificial Intelligence Architect at the DoD Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, where he provided strategic direction and technical direction for data engineering, data science, AI engineering, and systems engineering that directly enabled the rapid development, testing, evaluation and delivery of over 35 different AI capabilities to help accelerate the adoption of AI across the Joint Force to transform the DoD.
LTC Bastian received his Ph.D. degree in industrial engineering and operations research from the Pennsylvania State University, M.Eng. degree in industrial engineering from Penn State, M.S. degree in econometrics and operations research from Maastricht University, and B.S. degree in electrical engineering with honors from USMA. He serves as the INFORMS Military and Security Society Vice-President/President-Elect, MORS Advisory Director, DARPA Information Sciences and Technology Study Group Member, The Coding School Advisory Board Member, and Penn State Institute for Computational and Data Sciences External Advisory Committee Member. He is an active member of INFORMS, MORS, ACM, IEEE and ACM.

Highlights

• Areas of Expertise: Optimization, Simulation, Statistical Computing, Machine/Deep Learning, Intelligent Systems, Big Data Analytics, Decision Science
• Textbook author

SAS Institute Inc., Retired

Radhika Kulkarni is the retired Vice President of Advanced Analytics R&D at SAS Institute Inc. In her position, she oversaw the development of software products as well as customer engagements solving large scale, enterprise wide business problems using analytics, data science and artificial intelligence.

Throughout her career, she has worked with multiple universities and within her retirement, she has been inspired to mentor young professionals in choosing careers in Analytics, Machine Learning, Data Science, etc. She is currently a member of the Analytics and Artificial Intelligence Advocate for Universities and Organizations. Radhika holds a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from the Presidency College in Madras, India, a master’s degree in Mathematics from the Indian Institute of Technology and a Ph.D. in Operations Research from Cornell University. She is also an INFORMS fellow.

Highlights

• Area of Expertise: Artificial intelligence
• 2022 INFORMS President

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Sheldon H. Jacobson is a Founder Professor of Computer Science, Director of the Simulation and Optimization Laboratory, and Founding Director of the Bed Time Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has a B.S. and M.S. in mathematics from McGill University and a Ph.D. in operations research from Cornell University.

Over the decades, Professor Jacobson has dedicated his effort to draw the attention of the public to the power of operations research and analytics for informed policy and decision making. He has made research contributions to operations research and optimization-based artificial intelligence. Additionally, he has written on a broad range of subjects: aviation security, healthcare, transportation, political redistricting and elections, etc. He is an INFORMS Fellow and has received the INFORMS Impact Prize.

Highlights

• Areas of Expertise: Informed policy and decision making, Aviation security, Healthcare, Transportation, Political redistricting, Elections

Johns Hopkins University

Tinglong Dai is a professor in the Carey Business School at Johns Hopkins University. His research interests span across healthcare, marketing-operations interfaces, and human-AI interaction. He can speak to supply chain angles to the COVID pandemic as far as resource allocation, food supply, vaccine allocation and creation among other things.

Dai has an M.Phil in Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management from Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, a M.S. in Industrial Administration and a Ph.D. in Operations Management/Robotics from Carnegie Mellon University. Dai's work has been published in leading journals such INFORMS Journal on Computing and has been recognized by INFORMS Public Sector Operations Research Best Paper Award.  

Highlights

• Areas of Expertise: Healthcare, Marketing-operations interfaces, Human-AI interaction
• Can speak to COVID-19 and supply chains with food supply, vaccine allocation, and resource allocation