I’m excited to become a regular member of GERAD. I have long been interested in cross-sectoral and multidisciplinary scientific research and in joint collaborations involving artificial intelligence (AI), data science, machine learning and decision making.

I have been a professor with the Computer Science department of the université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) for over 13 years. I’m also the vice-director of UQAM’s Research Center in Artificial Intelligence (CRIA).

My research activities fall mainly under the heading of artificial intelligence, including Natural Language Processing (NLP) and machine learning. More specifically, I’m interested in the processing of languages and areas that lack learning data and/or conclusive data. Here are some examples of fields explored in collaboration with industrial partners: medicine, transport, digital humanities and electronics.

NLP, a discipline that straddles linguistics, computer science and artificial intelligence, involves applying computer programs and techniques to every aspect of human language. The following are some of its applications: information searches (unilingual, translingual or multilingual); big data processing; chatbot design; automated translation; and (semi-) automatic construction of language resources.

I’m interested in basic and applied research and in collaborations with industrial partners. I’m currently involved in some collaborations, funded by Mitacs (and in the past, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)), such as with Thales, Ciéna, the National Bank, Videns Analytics, and some startups. Another research topic I feel strongly about is Indigenous issues and realities.

My past experience includes being a researcher at the National Research Council of Canada, where I contributed to the Global Autonomous Language Exploitation program funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. I did my master’s (2000) and my PhD (2003) in computer science at the Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Japan. My postdoctoral studies were done at the National Institute of Informatics, Japan, with funding from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

Financing for my research and international and/or multidisciplinary collaborations has come from the Fonds de recherche du Québec – Nature et technologies, NSERC, Mitacs and the Qatar National Research Fund.