Nick Jennings (computer scientist)

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Nick Jennings CB FREng FCGI FIET FBCS FRSA MAE CEng CITP
Jennings in April 2009
Born	Nicholas Robert Jennings December 1966 (age 54) London, England
Education	Weymouth Grammar School
Alma mater	University of Exeter (BSc) Queen Mary University of London (PhD)
Known for	Regius Professor of Computer Science Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security
Spouse(s)	Dr. Joanne Jennings
Awards	IJCAI Computers and Thought Award (1999) ACM SIGART Autonomous Agents Research Award (2003)[1] BCS Lovelace Medal (2020)
Scientific career
Fields	Artificial intelligence[2] Multi-agent systems[2] Computer science[2] Intelligent agents[2]
Institutions	Imperial College University of Southampton Queen Mary University of London Loughborough University
Thesis	Joint Intentions as a Model of Multi-Agent Cooperation (1992)
Doctoral advisor	Abe Mamdani[3][4]
Doctoral students	Peyman Faratin[5]
Website	imperial.ac.uk/people/n.jennings

Nicholas Robert Jennings CB FREng FCGI FIET FBCS FRSA MAE CEng CITP is the Vice-Provost for Research and Enterprise^[6] at Imperial College London, where he is also a Professor of Artificial Intelligence. He was previously the UK's first Regius Professor of Computer Science and the inaugural Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government on National Security.^[7] 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,^[8] Contact Engine,^[9] Crossword Cyber Security,^[10] and Reliance Cyber Science.^[11] He is also an adviser to Darktrace,^[12] a member of the UK Government's AI Council^[13] and the Monaco Digital Advisory Council,^[14] chair of the National Engineering Policy Centre and a council member for the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.^[15]

Education and early life[]

Jennings was born in London.^[16] He grew up on the Isle of Portland in Dorset and attended Weymouth Grammar School. He studied for an undergraduate degree in computer science at the University of Exeter and his PhD was from the Department of Electronic Engineering at Queen Mary, University of London.^[3][5]

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 in flexible ways and with building 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 partnership.

In undertaking this research, he has attracted grant income of over £33M, published more than 650 articles (with over 400 co-authors^[18][2]) 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^[2] and an h-index of 125.^[20]

From 1988 he was at Queen Mary, University of London, where he was a PhD student, lecturer, reader and professor.^{[citation needed]}

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, 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 UK's first Regius Professor of Computer Science in 2014.

From 2010 to 2015, he was the UK Government's Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security.^[21]

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

In 2021, he was announced to be the next Vice-Chancellor and President of Loughborough University.

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.^[22]

• 1999 (1999): IJCAI Computers and Thought Award
• 2000 (2000): IEE Achievement Medal for contributions to agent-based computing^{[citation needed]}
• 2003 (2003): ACM Autonomous Agents Research Award for contributions to the field of agent-based computing^[23]
• 2004 (2004): Team leader of winning agent in the 20th Anniversary Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma Competitions^[24]
• 2007 (2007): Team leader of winner of Trading Agents Competition on Mechanism Design (CAT)^{[citation needed]}
• 2007 (2007): ARGUS II project winner of The Engineer's Large Company / University Collaboration Award^{[citation needed]}
• 2007: Int. Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems Special Recognition Award for “Intelligent agents: theory and practice” in The Knowledge Engineering Review^[25]
• 2008 (2008): Winner of "Best Industrial Demonstrator" award at International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Systems Conference^{[citation needed]}
• 2009 (2009): Winner of The Engineer Award for Best Aerospace and Defence Project for ALADDIN^{[citation needed]}
• 2010 (2010): Winner of Best Paper Award at International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (out of 685 submissions)^{[citation needed]}
• 2010 (2010): Winner 1st International Competitions on the Lemonade Stand Game^{[citation needed]}
• 2011 (2011): Winner 2nd International Competitions on the Lemonade Stand Game^{[citation needed]}
• 2012 (2012): Winner US State Department's TAG challenge on social mobilisation and rapid information gathering^[26]
• 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^[27]
• 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^[28]
• 2020: BCS Lovelace Medal

Fellowships[]

• 2003 (2003): Fellow European Association for Artificial Intelligence
• 2003 (2003): Fellow British Computer Society (FBCS)^[29]
• 2004 (2004): Fellow Institution of Engineering and Technology (FIET)^[30]
• 2005 (2005): Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng)^[31]
• 2006 (2006): Fellow Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and the Simulation of Behaviour (AISB)^[32]
• 2008 (2008): Member of the Academia Europaea (MAE)^[33]
• 2008 (2008): Fellow Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (FIEEE)^[34]
• 2010 (2010): Fellow Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI)^[35]
• 2012 (2012): Fellow German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI)^[36]
• 2018: Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA)
• 2019: Fellow City and Guilds of London Institute
• 2020: Honorary Fellow of the Cybernetics Society.^[37]

Personal life[]

Jennings is married to Jo and they have two children. He is a keen cricketer, playing for Bishops Waltham Cricket Club, ^[38] and previously managed a youth football team at Waltham Wolves ^[39]

References[]