Nick Jennings (computer scientist)

Nicholas Robert Jennings CB FREng FCGI FIET FBCS FRSA MAE CEng CITP is the Vice-Provost for Research and Enterprise[7] at Imperial College London, where he is also a Professor of Artificial Intelligence. He was previously the first Regius Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton and the inaugural Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government on National Security.[8] He is an authority in the areas of AI, autonomous systems, agent-based computing and cybersecurity. He is involved in a number of startups including Aerogility,[9] Contact Engine,[10] Crossword Cyber Security,[11] and Reliance Cyber Science[12]. He is also an adviser to Darktrace[13], a member of the UK Government's AI Council[14] and the Monaco Digital Advisory Council[15], and a council member for the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.[16]

Nick Jennings

CB FREng FCGI FIET FBCS FRSA MAE CEng CITP
Jennings in April 2009
Born
Nicholas Robert Jennings

December 1966 (age 53)
London, England
EducationWeymouth Grammar School
Alma mater
Known forAgent-based modelling[1]
Regius Professor of Computer Science
Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security
Spouse(s)Dr. Joanne Jennings
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
Institutions
ThesisJoint Intentions as a Model of Multi-Agent Cooperation (1992)
Doctoral advisorAbe Mamdani[4][5]
Doctoral students
Websiteimperial.ac.uk/people/n.jennings

Education and early life

Jennings was born in London. He grew up on the Isle of Portland in Dorset and attended Weymouth Grammar School and studied for an undergraduate degree in computer science at the University of Exeter. His PhD was from the Department of Electronic Engineering at Queen Mary, University of London.[4][6]

Research and career

Jennings' research focus is on developing AI systems for large-scale, open and dynamic environments. In particular, he is interested in how to endow individual autonomous agents with the ability to act and interact with engineering systems that contain both humans and software agents. He has been involved with deployments of systems in domains such as business process management, smart energy systems, sensor networks, disaster response, telecommunications, citizen science and eDefence—and generally advocating the area of agent-oriented software engineering. His most recent project, ORCHID,[17] developed the science of Human-Agent Collectives (HACs) in which humans and software agents collaborate in a seamless manner.

In undertaking this research, he has attracted grant income of over £32M, published more than 650 articles (with some 370 co-authors[18][3]) and graduated over 50 PhD students (including two winners and one runner-up of the British Computer Society (BCS)/CPHC Distinguished Dissertation Award.[19]) He has over 80,000 citations in Google Scholar[3] and an h-index of 125.[20]

From 1988 he was at Queen Mary, University of London, where he was a PhD student, research fellow, lecturer, reader and professor.

In 1999, he moved to the Department of Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Southampton where he was the Deputy Head of Department (Research), the Associate Dean (Research and Enterprise) for the Faculty of Engineering, Science and Maths, the Head of the Agents, Interaction and Complexity group and the Head of Department. He was appointed the Regius Professor of Computer Science in 2014.

From 2010 to 2015, he was the UK Government's Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security.

In 2016, he moved to Imperial College to be the Vice-Provost (Research and Enterprise), as well as a Professor of Artificial Intelligence.

Awards

Jennings was appointed Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to computer science and national security science.[21]

  • 1999 (1999): IJCAI Computers and Thought Award
  • 2000 (2000): IEE Achievement Medal for contributions to agent-based computing
  • 2003 (2003): ACM Autonomous Agents Research Award for contributions to the field of agent-based computing[22]
  • 2004 (2004): Team leader of winning agent in the 20th Anniversary Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma Competitions[23]
  • 2007 (2007): Team leader of winner of Trading Agents Competition on Mechanism Design (CAT)
  • 2007 (2007): ARGUS II project winner of The Engineer's Large Company / University Collaboration Award
  • 2007: Int. Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems Special Recognition Award for “Intelligent agents: theory and practice” in The Knowledge Engineering Review
  • 2008 (2008): Winner of "Best Industrial Demonstrator" award at International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Systems Conference
  • 2009 (2009): Winner of The Engineer Award for Best Aerospace and Defence Project for ALADDIN
  • 2010 (2010): Winner of Best Paper Award at International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (out of 685 submissions)
  • 2010 (2010): Winner 1st International Competitions on the Lemonade Stand Game
  • 2011 (2011): Winner 2nd International Competitions on the Lemonade Stand Game
  • 2012 (2012): Winner US State Department's TAG challenge on social mobilisation and rapid information gathering
  • 2016: IJCAI-JAIR Best Paper Prize (Honourable Mention) for “Theoretical and practical foundations of large-scale agent-based micro-storage in the smart grid” in Journal of AI Research
  • 2016: The Engineer’s “Collaborate to Innovate” Award for the ORCHID project
  • 2018: Int. Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems Influential Paper Award for “Developing multiagent systems: the Gaia methodology” in ACM Trans. on Software Engineering and Methodology

Fellowships

Personal life

Jennings is married to Jo and they have two children.[25] previously managing a youth football team at Waltham Wolves,[26]

References
  1. Wooldridge, Michael; Jennings, Nicholas R. (2009). "Intelligent agents: theory and practice". The Knowledge Engineering Review. 10 (2): 115. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.409.8328. doi:10.1017/S0269888900008122. ISSN 0269-8889.
  2. "AA Award". Sigai.acm.org. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
  3. Nick Jennings publications indexed by Google Scholar
  4. Jennings, Nicholas (1992). Joint intentions as a model of multi-agent cooperation in complex dynamic environments. soton.ac.uk (PhD thesis). Queen Mary, University of London. OCLC 940336317. EThOS uk.bl.ethos.336484.
  5. Dubois, D.; Prade, H. (2012). "Abe Mamdani: A Pioneer of Soft Artificial Intelligence". Combining Experimentation and Theory. Studies in Fuzziness and Soft Computing. 271. p. 49. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-24666-1_4. ISBN 978-3-642-24665-4.
  6. Nick Jennings at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  7. "Vice-Provost (Research and Enterprise)". Imperial College London.
  8. "Chief Scientific Advisers". Bis.gov.uk. Retrieved 13 November 2018.
  9. "Aerogility | the future of decision making". Arogility.com. Retrieved 13 November 2018.
  10. "ContactEngine - Perfect Customer Journeys". ContactEngine.com. Retrieved 13 November 2018.
  11. "Crossword Cybersecurity". Crosswordcybersecurity.com. Retrieved 13 November 2018.
  12. "Reliance acsn - IT Security Experts". Relianceacsn.co.uk.
  13. "Advisory Board".Darktrace
  14. "AI Council".
  15. "Creation of the Monaco Digital Advisory Council / A la Une du Portail / Portail du Gouvernement - Monaco".
  16. "EPSRC council - EPSRC website".
  17. "The ORCHID Project". Orchid.ac.uk.
  18. Nicholas R. Jennings at DBLP Bibliography Server
  19. "Distinguished Dissertations - Awards and competitions - Events - BCS - The Chartered Institute for IT". Bcs.org. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
  20. "Top H-Index for Computer Science and Electronics".
  21. "No. 61450". The London Gazette (Supplement). 30 December 2015. p. N3.
  22. "AA Award". Sigai.acm.org. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
  23. Kendall, Graham. "Prisoner's Dilemma". Prisoners-dilemma.com. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
  24. "List of Fellows". Raeng.org.uk.
  25. "Bishop's Waltham CC". Bishopswaltham.play-cricket.com.
  26. "Waltham Wolves Youth Football Club".
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