Kate Larsen

Kate Larson
Professor, Cheriton School of Computer Science,
University of Waterloo
Research Scientist, DeepMind

Kate Larson is an acclaimed AI (Artificial Intelligence) researcher whose work focuses on multi-agent systems and brings together computer science, mathematics, and economics.

As the daughter of a biology professor at Memorial University in Newfoundland, Kate thought she might like to study biology. “The trouble was that everyone in the department knew me as Katie, my father’s daughter,” she says. A very good course in first-year mathematics sparked her interest and led her to major in the subject as an undergraduate at Memorial.

Kate received an NSERC Undergraduate Research Award, and it was Sherry Mantyka, her supervisor for the research project that she conducted related to the award, who encouraged Kate to attend graduate school. She explains, “Sherry was very supportive and an important mentor. She submitted my project, which was on math and cognitive science, to a research conference. That was a really big deal!”

When looking at options for graduate school, Kate initially considered math programs in Canada, but was intrigued by the advice given by a researcher she met at a conference to study computer science in the United States. “I chose to focus on a field I knew nothing about in a place that was unfamiliar to me,” says Kate.

Kate earned a Masters’ degree in Computer Science at Washington University in St. Louis and went on to complete her PhD in Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. Committee members for her thesis dissertation, Mechanism Design for Computationally Limited Agents, included computer scientists and a microeconomic theorist, exemplifying the multi-disciplinary nature of her research.

Kate’s research focuses on multiagent systems and reinforcement learning and applications of AI to support sustainable development and climate-related initiatives. She is especially interested in research challenges that emerge when cooperation is made the heart of AI systems. Issues associated with cooperation are pervasive and important and can be found at scales ranging from daily routines like driving on highways, scheduling meetings and working collaboratively, to global challenges like peace, commerce, and pandemic preparedness. With AI-powered machines playing an increasingly greater role in our lives, it will be important to equip them with the capabilities necessary to cooperate and foster cooperation.

Kate’s work has earned her a Province of Ontario Early Researcher Award, the Canadian Association of Computer Science/Association d’informatique canadienne (CACS/AIC) Outstanding Young Researcher Prize, a University of Waterloo Research Chair and the Pasupalak AI Fellowship. She currently splits her research time as a Professor in the Cheriton School of Computer Science at the University of Waterloo, and as a Research Scientist at DeepMind in Montreal.

Kate’s role as a researcher and professor has included serving as graduate student supervisor and PhD thesis examiner and committee member for many students during the 20 years she has been on faculty at the University of Waterloo. She is also an active member of the university community, acting as Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Cheriton School of Computer Science during the COVID pandemic and as a member of the University Senate representing the Faculty of Mathematics. Kate has also been active in outreach activities to female high school students and in events for university students to promote Computer Science as a career option for women. 

The international scientific community has benefitted from Kate’s expertise in her roles as a member of the International Joint Conferences on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI) Board of Trustees Board, program chair for the IJCAI 2024 conference, and member of the Computing Research Association (CRA) and CS-Can|Info-Can Boards of Directors. She is Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, and has served as Associate Editor and member of the editorial board for a range of AI scientific journals.

Kate strongly believes that the advancement of AI will benefit greatly from collaborative research that incorporates a diversity of ideas and backgrounds, leading to the consideration of a range of interesting questions. “Issues affecting those with lower incomes, women, and minority populations need to be addressed in AI research. A homogenous group of researchers will develop tools to solve a narrow set of problems,” notes Kate. Kate Larson’s research on cooperation in AI, her emphasis on diversity and interdisciplinary research teams, and her work in both academia and industry are leading the way to machines learning to find common ground to address a wide range of global challenges.

Alfred Menezes

Dr. Alfred Menezes
Professor, Faculty of Mathematics, University of Waterloo

In 1983, as a Grade 13 high school student at St. Aquinas Secondary School in Bramalea, Ontario, Alfred Menezes’ dream was to attend the University of Waterloo. Born in Tanzania and raised in Kuwait, Alfred came to Ontario to live with his aunt and uncle for his final year of high school, with plans to attend university in Canada.

Although he had never used a computer, Alfred and his parents had been assured that a career in computer science would be the path to a good future. “I had good teachers in high school, liked math a lot, and was good at it,” notes Alfred. Waterloo had acquired a reputation as an emerging school for computer science, so he applied to and was accepted by the Faculty of Mathematics.

A visit to Alfred’s math class by Professor Scott Vanstone from the university’s Department of Combinatorics and Optimization in the Faculty of Mathematics was a defining moment in his academic and career path. “Scott talked to us about St. Jerome’s College at UW and gave an informal lecture on cryptography. Before he left, he shook my hand. His visit made a major impression on me – I signed up to live and study at St. Jerome’s right away. I would otherwise never have dreamt of doing so.”

Scott was on sabbatical during Alfred’s first year at St. Jerome’s, but Alfred ran into him again at the beginning of his second year, while lined up to register and pay tuition fees. “I saw Scott, but was too shy to speak to him, so I turned away. Scott stopped and said “Hi Alfred, how’s it going?” – remembering me and my name from his visit to my high school 18 months earlier!”

In Alfred’s third year of study, Scott arranged an undergrad research term for him – the beginning of his research career. “I didn’t have other plans after graduation, so I did a Master’s degree, with Scott as my academic supervisor. I wanted to continue to live in Canada, so went on to complete a PhD, working again with Scott. My work on cryptography progressed from a summer undergrad project to my research focus.” His main areas of research are Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC), provable security, and related areas.

Alfred’s first academic position was as a professor at Auburn University in Alabama. When Scott Vanstone and Doug Stinson were awarded research chairs in 1998, creating additional research positions at the University of Waterloo, Alfred returned as a faculty member at his alma mater.

“The field of cryptography is fast-moving. My academic work and interaction with Scott, who had co-founded Certicom with UW faculty members Ron Mullin and Gord Agnew, introduced me to the industry,” says Alfred.  In addition to research and teaching, Alfred has worked as a consultant for Certicom, BlackBerry, InfoSec Global, and TrustPoint Innovation.

While at the University of Waterloo, Alfred co-founded the Centre for Applied Cryptographic Research and served as its Managing Director. He is currently a member of the Cybersecurity and Privacy Institute. In 2001 he won the Hall Medal of the Institute of Combinatorics and its Applications.

Alfred’s book, Elliptic Curve Public Key Cryptosystems, published in 1993, was the first book devoted entirely to ECC. He co-authored, with Scott Vanstone and Paul van Oorschot, the widely-used reference book Handbook of Applied Cryptography.

Alfred’s focus for the last several years has been on teaching. “I have always loved teaching and have taught cryptography 19 times during my tenure at the University of Waterloo.” The very popular course, the largest fourth-year course in the Faculty of Mathematics, has attracted 250 students for each of the last seven offerings. Alfred’s current challenge is to move the class online in order to reach a broader audience.

“I will be retiring from the university next August, and have decided to become a YouTuber!” says Alfred. He started producing video classes during the pandemic and found that using good audio and camera equipment, adding music, special effects and some humour made lectures a bit lively and less boring and generic to students stuck at home watching video lectures all day.

His first courses offered on his YouTube channel, including Error-Correcting Codes and Post-Quantum Cryptography (Kyber and Dilithium), launched in August and have been well-received, with almost 3,000 views in their first two weeks online. “The post-quantum cryptography course is accessible to cryptographers, but not the general public. The next course, on applied cryptography, will be more accessible and should have a larger audience, including undergraduate students who want to focus on cryptography but don’t have a course available to them at their university and the professors in many countries who don’t have the knowledge or the time to learn the material well,” says Alfred. Developers who want to learn more about the field but find that textbooks on the subject are too mathematical, too elementary, or just outdated, are another potential audience.

Alfred plans to work with contacts in southern Africa to gather students from neighbouring universities to watch videos. He will offer follow-up online office hours two or three times per week to answer questions and will conduct further discussions and answer questions on a Discord channel. He is currently developing a three to four-year plan of courses, topics, accessible videos, and potential interviews with notable people to offer via his channel if the audience is large enough.

Alfred Menezes has come a long way from the shy student who enjoyed and excelled at math in high school. He is recognized internationally as an expert in the field of cryptography and his love of teaching is appreciated by his students who routinely rate his courses as “awesome” or “great.” Students’ online comments about his teaching include “One of the best profs I’ve ever had. His lectures are very clear and informative and he has a passion for the subject,” and “Best prof ever!” His YouTube channel will introduce students around the world to cryptography and will provide them the opportunity to benefit from Alfred’s expertise, passion and talent for teaching.

CS-Can|Info-Can Outstanding Early Stage Computer Science Researcher Awards

Profound Impact is proud to sponsor the 2023 CS-Can|Info-Can Outstanding Early Career Computer Science Researcher Awards. The awards will be presented at the Second CS-Can|Info-Can Conference Co-Located with CASCON, November 11-14 at York University in Toronto. Congratulations to all three winners!

16-2

Roger Grosse of University of Toronto

Dr. Roger Grosse is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Toronto. With a robust research focus on machine learning and artificial intelligence, Dr. Grosse’s work explores innovative approaches to learning algorithms and their applications. His research interests span topics such as neural network training, probabilistic models, and scalable learning methods.

Dr. Grosse holds a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge and has contributed significantly to the field through numerous publications and collaborations. His work is instrumental in advancing our understanding of complex machine-learning systems and their practical implementations.

As a leading researcher, Dr. Grosse is committed to pushing the boundaries of what is possible with machine learning technologies, making impactful contributions to both academia and industry.

18-1

Ali Ouni of ETS Montréal 

Dr. Ali Ouni is a Professor at École de Technologie Supérieure (ETS) in Montréal, specializing in computer vision and machine learning. His research focuses on developing advanced algorithms for visual perception, object recognition, and scene understanding.

Dr. Ouni’s work is pivotal in the fields of computer vision and artificial intelligence, where he explores innovative techniques to improve visual data analysis and interpretation. His contributions aim to enhance the capabilities of machine learning systems in understanding and interacting with visual information.

With a robust academic background and a strong track record of research, Dr. Ouni is dedicated to advancing the state of the art in computer vision and its applications, driving progress in both academic and practical contexts.

17-2

Liam Paull of Université de Montréal

Dr. Liam Paull is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Operations Research at the Université de Montréal. His research focuses on robotics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning, with a particular emphasis on developing algorithms that enable robots to perceive and interact with complex environments.

Dr. Paull’s work explores areas such as autonomous systems, robot perception, and human-robot interaction. He is dedicated to advancing the field of robotics through innovative research and applications that address real-world challenges.

With a strong academic background and a commitment to impactful research, Dr. Paull is shaping the future of robotics and AI, contributing valuable insights and technological advancements to the field.

Anita T. Layton

Anita T. Layton
Professor of Applied Mathematics, Computer Science, Pharmacy and Biology
Canada 150 Research Chair in Mathematical Biology and Medicine
University of Waterloo

As the daughter of a mathematics teacher, it was assumed that Anita Layton would follow in her father’s footsteps to study math. “All of my father’s colleagues said, ‘You will be a mathematician like your dad.’ I was rebellious and didn’t know what I liked – but I knew that I didn’t want to do math because everybody expected that I would!”

Anita’s journey from Hong Kong, where she spent her first 18 years, to Duke University in North Carolina, was prompted by her father’s lifelong desire to complete a PhD degree in the United States. “His family was poor, so he took a job instead of pursuing graduate studies,” she says. “I was told, from a very young age, that I would earn a PhD in the US. My father chose Duke and I chose physics and computer science as my majors – even though I had never taken a computer science course before college. I hadn’t thought about majoring in computer science until I realized I couldn’t do experiments – I’m really clumsy. With computer science, if something isn’t right, there is no fire and nobody has to know. You can just go back and fix it!”

While Anita was completing her undergraduate degree in North Carolina, her family moved to Richmond Hill, a suburb of Toronto. She decided to pursue her graduate studies at the University of Toronto, completing a PhD in computer science on numerical weather prediction in 2001. Her first postdoc was at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder.

Anita married Harold Layton, a mathematics professor at Duke University, in 2000, and wanted to return to North Carolina. She completed a second postdoc at Duke and then was hired as a tenure-track professor of mathematics there. “My husband was doing kidney research. I was tired of weather research after doing it for years and I wanted to work on anything but weather,” she says. She read one of her husband’s papers and noted that the kidney is about blood flow, which can be described with the same equations as the movement of the air in weather. “I thought – that’s cool.  Maybe I can try my hand at it as a mathematical modeler even though I don’t know much biology,” she added.

Anita was a trained numerical analyst who used computers to solve mathematical equations very quickly, looking at other people’s models and systems of mathematical equations and working to solve them better, faster and more accurately. This skill, along with the biology she learned, eventually allowed her to build her own models. “I learned a lot about biology during that time. I attended biology meetings to meet people and to build professional relationships and was ultimately recognized as belonging to the research community,” she said.

Anita spent 16 years at Duke University, where she was the Robert R. & Katherine B. Penn Professor of Mathematics, and also held appointments in the department of biomedical engineering and the department of medicine. She was recruited to the University of Waterloo in 2018 as a Canada 150 Research Chair in Mathematical Biology and Medicine. Anita is currently Professor of Applied Mathematics, Computer Science, Pharmacy and Biology at the University of Waterloo and heads the Layton Group, a diverse and interdisciplinary team of researchers that use computational modeling tools to better understand aspects of health and disease. 

Layton Group undergraduate, graduate students and postdocs collaborate with physiologists, biomedical engineers, and clinicians to formulate detailed models of cellular and organ function. She explains, “My research had focused on the application of mathematics to biological systems to understand the impacts of diabetes and hypertension on kidney function as well as the effectiveness of novel therapeutic treatments. My research has since expanded to focus on drug simulation and how some drugs work better in men than in women.”

Anita’s work as an internationally acclaimed authority and leading researcher in mathematical medicine and biology has been recognized by a range of organizations, including the Canadian Mathematical Society with the Krieger–Nelson Prize in 2021, the Women’s Executive Network as a Top 100 Most Powerful Women in Canada, by the Association for Women in Mathematics as a 2022 Fellow, by the Royal Society of Canada as a 2022 Fellow and 2023 John L. Synge Award winner and by the Federation of Chinese Canadian Professionals as 2023 winner of the Award of Merit.

In addition to her work as a renowned researcher, Anita is active in the research community. She is an Associate Editor of SIAM Review Book Section, an Associate Editor of SIAM Journal on Applied Dynamical Systems, a Section Editor (AI/Machine Learning) of Hypertension and an Associate Editor of Maple Transactions. She says, “I love research but for most of my career, I’ve also held substantial administrative positions. I was Chair of the Arts and Sciences Council for three years at Duke and served as the Associate Dean, Research and International, for the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo. I like to improve things and took the Associate Dean to help promote my colleagues’ research.”

Equity, diversity and inclusion are also very important to Anita. She serves on, and chairs, the Research Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Council at the University of Waterloo. She has also been active with the university’s Women in Math initiative, which encourages and advocates for women and gender minorities who are interested in studying mathematics and who seek careers in mathematics. She says, “There are many reasons women are discouraged from studying math. Through the Dean’s Distinguished Women in Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science Lecture Series, we bring role models to speak to and with grad students. These excellent speakers, who also are renowned researchers and experienced mentors, are able to talk to and encourage those students.”

When asked what’s next in her career, Anita says, “I’m happy running my research program, but I want to do more to promote a supportive and rich environment for research and education in Canada. I’m especially interested in what I can contribute to science.”

Her advice to young people when considering what career to pursue is to “Follow your heart and your talent. Do something that keeps you happy and that you can do well.” For women in mathematics, Anita advises, “Keep your eyes open to find allies, both men and women, who can understand your concerns.”

Mathematics is the new microscope for Anita Layton and the members of her research group. Her work has inspired new experimental and clinical studies in renal physiology and related medical care, has constructed models to simulate new diabetes drugs, has highlighted the importance of sex differences in hypertension and has developed a new approach for diagnosing autism in children. And her passion for mentoring women and gender minorities and fostering diversity is a powerful demonstration of her commitment to the mathematics community at large.

Kelly Lyons

Dr. Kelly Lyons
Professor, Faculty of Information, Cross-Appointed to the Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
Interim Director, Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society

Kelly Lyons has always loved solving tricky puzzles and enjoyed math and science in high school. “Physics was my favourite,” she says.  But when Mr. Lowe, her physics teacher asked her what she wanted to do when she graduated, she told him she hadn’t decided. He had a suggestion: “You should try Computer Science. My daughter is a computer scientist. She loves math and she loves physics and now she makes a ton of money and travels all over the world.”

Kelly was born and raised in Fort Frances, Ontario, an isolated town of 8,000 people located between Winnipeg and Thunder Bay. “I went across the border to International Falls, Minnesota, to movies, dances and even for my piano lessons.” While many of her friends got jobs after high school, Kelly wanted to go to University. “I loved everything about school. I loved studying.  Weirdly, I even loved exams.” She took Mr. Lowe’s advice and traveled east to Queen’s University to study computer science.

After completing her undergraduate degree, she applied for, and was awarded, an NSERC postgraduate scholarship to attend graduate school. “At the time, many of my university classmates were applying for jobs, so I submitted my resume to Bell Northern Research, Nortel and IBM, all of whom were interviewing on campus.”

The manager from IBM was very enthusiastic during the interview. “I’ve already decided that I’m going to hire you,” announced the interviewer from IBM. “I just haven’t decided yet which team I’m going to put you on.”

Kelly deferred her NSERC scholarship for two years to take the job at IBM, where she worked on the testing team for Fortran compilers. “When I arrived at IBM, I told my manager that I would only be in the position for two years before returning to Queen’s for graduate school. He told me that he was going to pretend he didn’t hear that because if he did, I wouldn’t be offered the opportunities I deserved. And I might change my mind about grad school.”

At the end of those two years, newly married and ready to move back to Kingston for graduate school, Kelly let her manager know that she was leaving and asked for advice on how to resign. He suggested, and she agreed, to take a leave of absence instead so that she could, if she wished, return to IBM after completing her graduate work.

After earning her master’s degree, she applied to and was accepted into the PhD program at Queen’s. “When I told my manager that now I was definitely quitting, he said something I’ve never forgotten: ‘Never say never. The world could change. You could change. IBM could change.’  So, instead of quitting, I took an extended leave of absence.”

IBM launched CAS, the Centre for Advanced Studies, in Toronto as Kelly was approaching the completion of her PhD. When an IBM representative visited the Queen’s campus to talk about CAS, she met him for lunch and learned more about the centre. “This sounded like a great place,” says Kelly. “I then met with Jacob Slonim, the head of CAS Toronto, who was enthusiastic about having me join.”

Kelly’s first role at IBM was as a software developer. Nineteen years later, in 2004, she was appointed as the Head of CAS Toronto, where she was responsible for approximately 60 applied collaborative research projects with universities, approximately 100 visiting university researchers, and CASCON, Canada’s premier international general computer science conference which hosted over 1,500 attendees annually.  

Kelly loved her work at CAS, where, in addition to heading the Centre, she co-supervised students and wrote research papers with them in her role as Adjunct Professor of Computer Science at Dalhousie University and York University. “One of my proudest moments as the Head of CAS Toronto was when the CAS Toronto partnerships won the NSERC Synergy Award for Innovation in the Leo Derikx category for ‘an established innovative model of long-standing university-industry partnership in pre-competitive R&D that has improved the general well-being of an industry.’ Another proud moment was in 2005 when CAS Toronto celebrated incredible people and their inspiring stories via the Computing Pioneers of Canada.”

Kelly’s tenure at IBM was meant to be short-term. “I always knew I wanted to be a professor”, she says. The next logical career move at IBM would have been much more administratively heavy than her role heading CAS, leaving very little time to conduct research or work with students. It was time to pursue her dream of being a professor.

“I have been very lucky to work with outstanding researchers and leaders from across Canada while at CAS,” notes Kelly. She consulted with some of those researchers and was encouraged to apply for an open position within the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto. She joined the faculty as Associate Professor in 2007 and is currently a Professor there with a cross-appointment to the Department of Computer Science.

Kelly’s experience in industry and as an active researcher has led her to work in a range of leadership roles at the University of Toronto.  From 2015 to 2020, she was Associate Dean, Academic in the Faculty of Information, and from 2020 to 2021, she served as the Dean’s Advisor on Pandemic Planning and Response. She served as Acting Vice Dean, Research and Program Innovation, in the School of Graduate Studies from January to June 2023.

In January, 2024, Kelly was appointed Interim Director of the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society (SRI) at the University of Toronto after serving both as a faculty affiliate and one of the institute’s three associate directors. SRI’s focus on multi-disciplinary research on how technology, systems and society interact is a good fit for Kelly’s research on service science, knowledge mobilization, data science, social media, collaborative work and software engineering. “What defines a service system is value co-creation. It takes at least two entities to come together to co-create a service – it can’t be created without a client in mind. I conduct research on how social media can play the role of technological intermediary between and among service systems,” says Kelly.

Kelly has served the computer science community through her role on the Board of Directors of CS-Can|Info-Can from 2020 – 2023 and as a Member‐at‐Large of the ACM Council from 2008 to 2012. She has supported, advocated, and celebrated women in computing as a member of the Executive Council of ACM‐W and by her contribution to the book Rendering History: The Women of ACM-W. Kelly was one of nine influential women who expressed their views on representation within the technical and AI communities for a recent article in Forbes magazine. In the article by Hessie Jones, titled A Call For A Systemic Dismantling: These Women Refuse To Be Hidden Figures In The Development Of AI, she is quoted as saying, “I have been fortunate to be part of a strong network of very smart, technical women in industry and academia. We may be smaller in proportion within the technical community, but we are large in our voices, our contributions, and our support for one another. The need for initiatives increasing diversity in tech—and especially in the world of artificial intelligence—is vital. We must ensure that the people working on AI systems reflect the concerns, experiences, and identities of the populations affected by these systems. Advocating for women in the AI sector requires a strong, united voice.”

As she begins to plan for the next phase of her career, including plans for retirement, Kelly is focusing an increasing amount of her time on mentoring. “My plan is to retire from teaching and administration and to continue research as a Professor Emerita,” says Kelly. “I decided that I need a way to decide which of the opportunities presented to me to pursue. I am choosing those in which I can collaborate with and support women and others at the margins in Computer Science.” 

Kelly’s career has included management and collaborative research roles at IBM, internationally-recognized research on developing technology with a human-centric approach, administrative leadership at the University of Toronto and service to the computer science community. And her success in her dream job as professor is best expressed by one of her students: “Kelly is a really good professor. She is compassionate and kind. She lights up the classroom with her passion about the subject matter.”

Tomasz Bednarz

Tomasz Bednarz
Director of Strategic Researcher Engagement
NVIDIA
Photography by Quentin Jones.

Tomasz Bednarz is passionate about connecting dots – whether between scientific concepts, across academic disciplines or to develop collaborations that bring people together to conduct ground-breaking research. “My team at NVIDIA actively engages with top researchers and premier research institutions that do compelling, computationally intense work to solve some of the world’s most challenging scientific problems,” says Tomasz. 

Tomasz grew up in Bukowno, near Krakow in Poland, where he was enthusiastic about low-level mathematics and how computers worked. “My family wasn’t rich but did everything to support me in my education. It was very hard for them to get my first computer, a wonderful 8-bit Commodore C64. Very quickly, I started to be very interested in demos, graphics and how they were produced.” Tomasz became fascinated by the monthly Commodore 64 magazine C64+4 and the pages of hexadecimal numbers it contained and was wowed when he realized that he could enter those numbers into his computer to produce music or visuals.

When he was in his mid-teens, Tomasz’s parents replaced the Commodore 64 with an IBM PC XT 12MHz – which came without fancy software or graphics. “Then, I wanted to learn from the bottom up how the processor worked and how to use Assembly x86 to program it. I was very lucky to get a reference book on Assembly x86 from the local high school and thought the best way I could learn would be to write computer viruses.” He developed three viruses that spread across the globe, but all were harmless by design. “After 6 months, I really wanted to find something other than writing viruses to drive my further learning,” he says.

Tomasz (AKA Warlock of Amnesty / Absence) counts himself lucky to have been living in Europe at that time, where Demoscene, an international underground computer subculture focused on producing demos that are the product of extreme programming and self-expression, was being developed and used by coders and musicians. “Demoscene is now accepted by UNESCO as an intangible cultural heritage in several countries. At the time, in the early 1990’s, we were pushing the limits of creativity, using very, very slow computers to make inspiring visualizations synchronized with tracked music.  All from scratch, with no books or internet to consult. By experimenting, I learned how to use lots of coding tricks to express myself visually – it was my very first school of life in aesthetics. I also learned how to build a Virtual Reality engine from scratch.” A few examples of Tomasz’s Demoscene award-winning coding works are Revolt from 1995, Voodka from 1996, Nie! from 1998, Syndrom-X from 1998 and his ACM SIGGRAPH blog post on Demoscene.

At the time, Demoscene participants used floppy disks to record code to exchange with fellow users across Europe. “At one point, I got into trouble with the post office when I started receiving 20 fat envelopes every day, each containing floppy disks. They wondered what I was up to!”

Tomasz studied physics in university, at the AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow, because he wanted to do something different than just basic computer science, and outside of his comfort zone. He had co-founded a software engineering company and was completing his Master’s degree when he received a call from his academic supervisor who was visiting Kyushu University in Japan, encouraging him to apply for entry to the PhD program there. “The only thing I knew about Japan was what I had learned about samurai from movies. But I decided to go outside of my comfort zone, completed the application, and was accepted,” Tomasz says.

Part of the application process was writing a proposal on what would be his PhD topic – magnetic hydrodynamics and using magnetic fields to play with gravity. “I knew almost nothing about this new topic but was very curious. I submitted the proposal and was accepted to the program with a scholarship. The call from my professor came in May and I was in Japan by September of that year,” he adds.

Tomasz believes that experimentation is an essential part of innovation. “Experiment to find your passion – it can transform your life,” he says. His academic and professional career paths reflect this view. He took a chance on moving to a country he knew little about to complete a PhD he hadn’t intended to pursue and followed up with an MBA in order to learn about leadership, strategy and how to manage people and organizations. Tomasz’s professional path has included working on the Nintendo NDS platform to develop low-level graphics code for a car racer game, leading a Visual/Hybrid Analytics Team at CSIRO’s Data61, and setting up and serving as Director and Head of Visualization at the Expanded Perception and Interaction Centre (EPICentre), a pioneering high-performance visualisation facility that boasted the highest resolution VR system in the world at ~120 Million pixels in 3D.

Tomasz has for many years served the international computer graphics community through his active participation as a volunteer with ACM SIGGRAPH, a global non-profit organization serving the evolution of computer graphics and interactive techniques. ACM SIGGRAPH, among other professional activities, produces two annual conferences that are world’s largest, most influential annual meetings and exhibitions in computer graphics and interactive techniques. Tomasz was ACM SIGGRAPH Asia 2019 Conference Chair when the conference was held for the very first time in Brisbane, Australia and attracted 5,120 participants from around the world.  He currently serves as a SIGGRAPH Asia Conference Advisory Group (SACAG) Chair, contributing to the future of SIGGRAPH Asia conferences and connecting the global research community, and is a voting director of the ACM SIGGRAPH Executive Committee. Over the last ten years, his volunteer roles within the organization have included Computer Animation Festival Jury member, Courses Chair, Virtual Augmented and Mixed Reality Jury, Frontiers Chair, reviewer, and conference panelist and presenter.

“I am very passionate about the role I’m in now. I love working at NVIDIA which is known to drive the graphics industry, AI, and many innovative research and applications,” says Tomasz.  His role in building a team of researcher DevRels from a range of disciplines to work with top researchers around the world connects all the dots of his academic career and team-building experience. “Our team has deep conversations about science with researchers to learn about what they’re working on and about long-term trends.  We want research labs to be successful and we can contribute to their success by mentoring graduate students and post-docs and helping researchers to take their research to the next level by using NVIDIA-developed technology, tools, and hardware,” he adds.

“My academic focus and my career have been all about connecting dots that were not previously connected,” says Tomasz. His work at NVIDIA, working with people from around the world with expertise in a range of disciplines, is helping to discover the new research superstars, the innovations they are building, and is developing a network of networks that will truly drive innovation to the next level.

Julita Vassileva

Professor of Computer Science
University of Saskatchewan

Julita Vassileva has been acclaimed both for the excellence of her research in Artificial Intelligence and Education, User Modelling and User-Adaptive Systems, Multi-Agent Systems, Trust and Reputation Mechanisms, Incentive Mechanisms, Online Communities and Social Computing, and her passion for promoting the status of women in computer science and in all areas of science and engineering where women are underrepresented.

Born and educated in Sofia, Bulgaria, Julita wanted to be a poet and writer as a teenager. But Bulgaria was a socialist country, freedom of speech was severely constrained, and only those whose creativity flew in the permitted channels could make a living as poets or writers. How did she choose a career in science? “I come from a family of scientists,” she says. “My grandfather was a professor in biochemistry.  My mother was an associate professor of chemistry and my father – of physics.”

She continues, “I hated math in primary school and wasn’t very good at it until we started learning geometry in grade 5. Suddenly I was captured by the simplicity of images and elegance of geometry as compared to the formal rules to be followed in algebra.”

Julita competed to be accepted to the Sofia Mathematics Gymnasium high school and she credits one great teacher, who taught her class for only three months in grade 9, for her enthusiasm for math. “The teacher creates the vocation,” says Julita. “He taught math in a completely different way. He didn’t follow the textbook but taught us as though we were university students, starting with complex numbers instead of teaching how to solve quadratic equations by ‘Just remember this formula’.” We saw the problem stretched on the plane with an imaginary axis and a real one instead of squeezed on a linear axis and suddenly the solution – the Viet formula – made perfect sense. I saw the link between algebra and geometry.  The whole class was hooked. He was also an opera singer. When a student solved a problem well at the blackboard, he would sing an aria!”

Julita studied mathematics and mechanics at Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski and, after completing her Ph.D. in mathematics and computer science, she accepted a position as a Research Associate at the Federal Armed Forces University in Munich. “This was after the fall of the Iron Curtain and it was now possible to travel from Bulgaria to the West,” says Julita. 

Although she enjoyed her time in Germany and wanted to pursue a career in research and academia, the position was limited to a five-year term. Julita’s home country was in deep economic turmoil, so returning to Bulgaria was not an option. She decided to make the move to Canada after receiving an offer from the University of Saskatchewan, where she would work in one of the five leading groups in the world conducting research in Applied AI, AI in Education and building good systems for teaching.

Julita’s ground-breaking research is focused on applying AI to solve education and social problems and includes intelligent tutoring that incorporates personalization and user modeling, multi-agent systems that build trust to ensure technology is seen as beneficial, designing incentive mechanisms that encourage participation in online communities and persuasive technology that facilitates behaviour changes to benefit users and their communities.

“Since people are motivated by different things, I am particularly interested in personalization approaches that tailor incentives for users depending on their personal features and the features of their groups and communities,” she says about her focus on building successful online communities and social computing applications.

Julita is passionate about science outreach and promoting the advancement of women and minorities in Computer Science. As the NSERC Cameco Chair for Women in Science and Engineering (WISE)/Prairies from 2005-2011, she developed the Science Ambassadors outreach program, which enriches classroom science learning in remote Indigenous communities. “Indigenous people are extremely underrepresented in Science and Engineering. What if we could encourage more women from Indigenous communities to enter these fields through a program that brings science students to the north to help the teachers teach science in interesting ways and to serve as role models?”

Julita credits colleagues Chary Rangacharyulu from the Department of Physics and Lee Wilson from the Department of Chemistry for the idea of Science Ambassadors. As Chair, she had the budget to make it happen by paying a summer job honorarium for University students to work with teachers and students in remote communities for one month. The program, which reaches over 2,000 children annually in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, covers the cost of flying university students to northern communities that have trouble attracting teachers. These students consult in advance with teachers to understand how they can help, and then develop and help deliver material based on those discussions.

The Science Ambassadors program has been active for 16 years and continues to be operated by the College of Arts and Science after Julita’s term as NSERC WISE Chair ended. “I am very proud of the program and the impact it has had on bringing a larger cohort of Indigenous students to the University of Saskatchewan,” she says.

In addition to the prestigious NSERC WISE Chair, Julita’s research and outreach work has been recognized with the University of Saskatchewan College of Arts and Science Distinguished Scientist Award in 2021 and with a Saskatoon YWCA’s Women of Distinction Award for Science and Technology in 2015. She has received appreciation letters from the Hon. Senator Lillian Dyck, and from the professional societies ACM and IEEE for her work on promoting women in science and engineering. She is proud of the many “Best Paper” and especially the “Best Student Paper” award certificates for her students that decorate a wall in her office.

Julita is enthusiastic about Saskatchewan and her work. “I felt as though I could finally breathe freely when I moved to Saskatchewan. I love the climate, the blue skies and the clean, white snow. And I love my research and working with my students. My happiest moments are when we hit “Submit” just before midnight after collaborating on a paper in the cloud for many hours with my students to meet a publication deadline!”

You can see more about Julita’s career and impact in the visualization below.

Luigi Benedicenti

Dean, Faculty of Computer Science
University of New Brunswick

Dr. Luigi Benedicenti joined the research community in Canada after receiving his Laurea in Electrical Engineering and Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Genoa in Italy. A Professional Engineer licensed in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick and a licensed Italian Engineer, Luigi joined the University of New Brunswick as Dean of the Faculty of Computer Science, Canada’s original faculty of computer science, in 2017.

Luigi’s interest in software engineering was sparked in high school when he worked on a version of a computer game being developed by Electronic Arts. The game was never released, but his appreciation for making and playing games led him to study computer engineering in his hometown of Genoa. “My father, who was a surgeon, was devastated when I didn’t follow in his career footsteps,” says Luigi. “But he did support me as I followed my passion.”

His journey from Italy to Canada came as a result of his academic supervisor’s move from Genoa to Calgary. Luigi traveled to Calgary to meet with his supervisor while completing his Ph.D. and applied for positions in Canada after graduation. He started his tenure at the University of Regina in 1998 as a lecturer. “When I landed in Regina, I didn’t have the right clothes. I was prepared for the weather in Calgary, but not for Regina’s temperatures of -30 to -50 degrees. The wind was so cold and deep that my eyelids froze the first time I walked to work!”

Luigi describes his 19 years at the University of Regina, where he served as a professor in the Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science and terms as Associate Dean for Special Projects, Associate Vice-President, Academic, and on the university’s Board of Governors as faculty representative, as an unforgettable experience during which he learned a lot and was afforded many opportunities for growth and innovation. While in Saskatchewan, Luigi developed strong connections with industry through his participation as a board member for SpringBoard West Innovations and SaskInteractive and as a Research Professor at TRLabs, where he conducted research in software engineering, mobile agents and media provision for 11 years.

“Being an academic involves, by definition, a relationship with the public. We are contributing to the common good and there are many ways to do that. Ours is a collective effort that has a significant impact – both via our research findings and through preparation of the next generation of researchers through teaching,” notes Luigi.  “I love teaching and research in more or less equal measure. They provide a nice balance and generate ideas as I move from one to the other. Teaching often provides surprising insights to my research.”

Luigi’s research focuses on Software Agents, Software Process, and New Media Technology and he specializes in program management and technology transfer. His interdisciplinary work has provided opportunities to collaborate with colleagues in Europe, South East Asia and across North America.  Although his role as Dean limits the time he is able to devote to research, Luigi continues to publish regularly, run conferences and symposia in his field, and has been a member of the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board (CEAB) from 2014 to 2021. “Being on a national accreditation board has been an exciting and challenging experience and I am humbled by my colleagues, who always bring contributions of the highest quality,” he says.

He is proud of the research excellence within the Faculty of Computer Science. “The Canadian Institute for Cybersecurity is one of the top three such research institutes in Canada,” notes Luigi. The outstanding young researchers within the institute balance between pure and applied research and provide immediate technology transfer to industry members through graduates who join those companies.

Spectral, UNB’s spatial computing training and research lab, combines virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality to bring together the digital and physical. Under the leadership of Dr. Scott Bateman, the lab conducts research with applications in areas including aerospace, health training, therapy and rehabilitation. “It’s one of the best User Interface/Human Computing research labs in North America,” says Luigi. 

One of the faculty’s newest research ventures, the Research Institute in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (RIDSAI), was developed in response to New Brunswick’s needs in the areas of AI and data science. “RIDSAI does more than conduct pure research,” says Luigi. “The institute is developing algorithms, applications and literacy in machine learning and data science to graduate students who will have the tools to succeed in a world that relies on these technologies.”  RIDSAI researchers from a range of disciplines work to develop solutions for community and industry partners in areas ranging from policy and planning to entertainment, agriculture and health. 

Luigi is deeply committed to excellence in the classroom and collaborative decision-making and is appreciative of the flexibility, interest and engagement of the members of the Faculty of Computer Science at the University of New Brunswick. “We can do something great and everyone can contribute in their own way,” he says. “Our collaborative culture leads to the good of the faculty as we work together on the mission and targets identified in the vision document we developed almost four years ago.”

A self-described passionate computer geek who loves programming, software engineering, computers, video games, and everything IT, Luigi also enjoys playing and creating music, traveling, and e-biking and is a pizza aficionado. As for his future plans, he says: “There are three stages to a career. I am exiting the middle and starting to prepare for the final stage. For me, retirement is about choice. I plan to work on research that has been postponed, experiment with pizza dough and enjoy hiking, skiing and life in general.”

Do you have an impact story to share? Let us know at connections@profoundimpact.com for a chance to be featured in an upcoming newsletter!