Our research activities span across most major AI areas, including knowledge representation, heuristic search and optimization, machine learning, constraint satisfaction, multi-agent systems, robotics, probabilistic modeling and reasoning, planning and scheduling.  We focus on fundamental AI research and are developing computational tools.  Our research also touches upon various application domains, such as computational biology, computational drug design, distributed sensor networks, and AI and law.

Faculty

• Yixin Chen
• Sally Goldman
• Stan C. Kwasny
• Ron Loui
• Bill Smart
• Weixiong Zhang (Director)

Publication news

• 5/30/2006:  Hui Zhang and Sally A. Goldman's paper on "Image Segmentation Using Salient Points-Based Object Templates" to appear in the Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Image Processing (ICIP 2006), October 2006.
• 5/30/2006:  Rouhollah Rahmani and Sally A. Goldman's paper on "MISSL: Multiple-Instance Semi-Supervised Learning" to appear in Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2006), June 2006.
• 5/30/2006:  Hui Zhang, Sharath Cholleti, Sally A. Goldman and Jason E. Fritts' paper on
  "Meta-Evaluation of Image Segmentation Using Machine Learning" to appear in Proceedings of IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR 2006), June 2006.
• 5/30/2006:  Hui Zhang and Sally A. Goldman's paper on "Perceptual Information of Images and the Bias in Homegeneity-based Segmentation" to appear in Proceedings of the 5th IEEE Workshop on Perceptual Organization in Computer Vision (POCV 2006), June 2006.
  
• 5/8/2006:  Guandong Wang and Weixiong Zhang's paper on "A steganalysis-based approach to comprehensive identification and characterization of functional regulatory elements" was accepted by Genome Biology.  In this paper, a novel machine learning method based on steganalysis, a technique for information hiding and discovery, was developed.  The method was applied to identify and analyze cis-regulatory elements, particularly transcription factor binding motifs, for the genes related to cell cycle regulation in budding yeast and model plant Arabidopsis thaliana.
  
• 4/15/2006:  Jianhua Ruan and Weixiong Zhang's paper on "Identification and evaluation of weak community structures in networks" was accepted to National Conf. on AI, (AAAI-06), 2006, for oral presentation.  According to AAAI, a total of 774 papers were submitted to the technical conference, including those for the special tracks on AI & the Web and Integrated Intelligent Capabilities. The program committee accepted a total of 236 papers, of which 171 (~22% of the total) were designated for oral presentation.
• 4/1/2006:  Sharlee Climer and Weixiong Zhang's paper on "Cut-and-solve: A linear search strategy for combinatorial optimization problems" is now in print with Artificial Intelligence.
• 3/1/2006: Y. Chen, along with C. Hsu and B. Wah at UIUC, has a paper, entitled "Temporal planning using subgoal partitioning and resolution in SGPlan", accepted to J. Artificial Intelligence Research.
• 2/20/2006: Zhao Xing, Yixin Chen and Weixiong Zhang have a paper on "An efficient hybrid strategy for temporal planning, Proc. 3rd Intern. Conf. on Integration of AI and OR Techniques for Constraint Programming for Combinatorial Optimization Problems (CP-AI-OR 2006), May 30-June 2, 2006, Cork, Ireland.  The acceptance rate is about 25%.
  
• 1/5/2006: Yixin Chen, along with Chih-Wei Hsu and Benjamin W. Wah at UIUC, won the best paper award at the 17th IEEE Intern. Conf. on Tools for AI for their paper on "Subgoal ordering and granularity control for incremental planning".

Funding and activity news

• 8/5/2006: Weixiong Zhang was invited to give a seminar on Finding Stress Inducible MicroRNA Genes in Plants at Department of Genetics, Washington University Medical School on Oct. 12.
  
• 8/1/2006: Yixin Chen received Department of Energy Early Career Principal Investigator Award.
  
• 7/16/2006: Weixiong Zhang gave a tutorial on Computational Biology: Perspective and Approaches Based on Feature Extraction and Selection at the 21st National Conf. on AI (AAAI-06), on July 16.
  
• 6/8/2006: The Washington University Team - Zhao Xing, Yixin Chen and Weixiong Zhang - won the First Award for the Optimal Planning Track of the 5th International Planning Competition at the 16th International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling, Windermere, Cumbia, UK, June 6-10, 2006. (Department news)
  
• 6/8/2006: The UIUC-Washington team - Benjamin W. Wah, Chih-Wei Hsu, Yixin Chen, and Ruoyun Huang - won the First Place Award for the Satisficing Track of the 5th International Planning Competition at the 16th International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling, Windermere, Cumbia, UK, June 6-10, 2006. (Department news)
• 3/20/2006: Weixiong Zhang received a new grant from Monsanto Corp. for research on Identification of Arabidopsis Stress-responsive MicroRNA Genes and Elucidation of their Regulatory Functions.
• 10/3/2005: Weixiong Zhang received a new grant from NSF for research on Mechanistic Heuristic Problem Solving and Search Algorithms that Exploit Phase Transitions and Backbones.  The total funding level is $315,000 for three years starting Nov. 1, 2005.
• 10/12/2005: Weixiong Zhang was invited to deliver a keynote speach at the 9th Pacific Rim Artifiical Intelligence Conference (PRICAI 2006), Guilin, Guangxi, China, 2006.
  
• 10/1/2005: Weixiong Zhang was invited to organize a special session on Search and Optimization Techniques and Their Applications at the 9th Intern. Symposium on AI and Mathematics.  Yixin Chen was invited to deliver a talk on his work on planning and scheduling at the special session.