1. MAPLE Research Overview Marie desJardins (mariedj@cs.umbc.edu)mariedj@cs.umbc.edu September 16, 2005

2. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 2 MAPLE  MAPLE = Multi-Agent Planning and Learning  Themes:  Integrated AI: Planning, learning, and interaction with other agents (human and machine)  Mixed-initiative (interactive) AI systems  Incorporating and modeling different types of knowledge Abstractions, qualitative models, background knowledge, preference functions, …  Organizational learning in multi-agent societies  Lifelong systems, embedded in real-world environments

3. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 3 Current students  Ph.D. students:  Blaz Bulka  Eric Eaton (B.A. 2003)  Matt Gaston (M.S. thesis 2002) (soon to be Ph.D. 2005!)  Priyang Rathod (M.S. thesis 2004)  Mike Smith  Qianjun Xu (M.S. thesis 2003)  Undergraduates:  Ryan Carr ’05  James MacGlashan ’05  Natalie Podrazik ‘05

4. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 4 Publications (2005)  Bhagavatula, Rheingans, and desJardins (EuroVis 2005)  Bulka, Gaston, and desJardins (AAAI-05 Workshop on Multiagent Learning)  desJardins (EISTA ’05)  desJardins, Getoor, and Rathod (ECML-05)  desJardins and Wagstaff (AAAI-05)  Eaton, desJardins, and Wagstaff (AAAI-05 Spring Symposium on Persistent Assistants)  Gaston and desJardins (AAAI-05 Workshop on Multiagent Learning)  Gaston and desJardins (AAAI-05)  Gaston and desJardins (AAMAS-05)  Gaston and desJardins (FLAIRS-05)  Shanbhag, Rheingans, and desJardins (InfoVis’05)  Smith and desJardins (AAMAS-05)  Smith and desJardins (AAMAS-05 Workshop on Trust)  Viswanathan and desJardins (AAMAS-05 Workshop on Large-Scale MAS)  Xu, desJardins, and Wagstaff (DS’05 – best student paper award!)  Xu, desJardins, and Wagstaff (FLAIRS-05)

5. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 5 Multi-agent systems  Pending NSF CAREER proposal  Adaptation of network structure in multi-agent societies (Matt)  Adaptation of agent strategies in networked multi-agent societies (Matt, Blaz)  Trust modeling for efficient multi-agent interactions (Mike)  “Emergent” distributed planning (Blaz)  Stable team formation strategies and protocols (Priyang)

6. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 6 Machine learning with background knowledge  NSF ITR grant (KEDS: Knowledge-Enhanced Discovery System)  Representing and learning preferences over sets (Ryan, James)  Incorporating feature abstraction hierarchies into Bayes net learning (Priyang)  Classification with instance-space misclassification costs (Natalie)  Extending constrained clustering... ... with a Gaussian propagation model (Eric) ... with “why” queries (Eric, (Craig))  Interactive clustering of relational data using graph layout (James, (Julia, Nataliya))

7. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 7 Active learning  DARPA Integrated Learning proposal  Actively collecting background knowledge (constraints) for spectral clustering (Qianjun)  Active knowledge acquisition for plan generation and analysis

8. 2/21/05 MAPLE Research Overview 8 Other research  Bioinformatics (Blaz)  Bioinformatics toolkit for amino acid data  Clustering of genomic data and supporting knowledge  Computational sequence alignment analysis  NSF grant (with Steve Freeland, Biology)  Interactive, multiattribute graph partitioning (Ryan, Priyang)  Application domains: school/political redistricting, zoning and planning, resource positioning  NSF grant (with Penny Rheingans)