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As early as 2001, Pascal Hitzler, then a Ph.D. candidate, was already dabbling in artificial intelligence. “I’m fascinated by the quest of devising and improving formal models (mathematical or computational) that mimic cognitive human abilities,” he says. “Most of my research touches on this and ranges from the foundational to the applied.”
Close to two decades later, he would join Kansas State University as an endowed professor to strengthen AI and data science at Kansas State University. Today, he heads the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Data Science (CAIDS), which aims to advance AI and data science research in the computer science department by supporting information exchange and collaboration between researchers.
One of the ways this is achieved at K-State is through the Institute for Digital Agriculture and Advanced Analytics, or ID3A. It focuses on the advancement of digital agriculture across the university and beyond, and AI is one of the relevant technologies for this. “ID3A has been established, and is led by faculty from seven departments from three colleges, and its activities involve research, education and outreach,” says Hitzler.
“Themes that we are discussing and starting to collaborate on include direct application of AI for detection and classification and also for control of autonomous machinery on the field, farm management, environmental impact assessment, etc. And centrally also the use of AI for creating and making use of integrated databases for informed decision making for agriculture and environmental stakeholders ranging from farmers via industry to government officials that set policies.”
Such is the scale and caliber of the research ecosystem that awaits anyone who joins its computer science graduate programs. There are many award-winning faculty members and funding for graduate students via research grants from the National Science Foundation or the university’s Game-changing Research Initiation Program, or GRIP, to name just two. In 2023, the university’s research expenditures were US$3.8 million and new research grants totaled US$2.5 million.
Alongside AI and data science, K-State focuses on the following core areas: cybersecurity, high-assurance software engineering, cyber-physical systems and computer science education. Whichever research area you’re interested in, there are opportunities to pursue research under the guidance and with the mentoring of faculty researchers.
“This hands-on research is actually the main part of their graduate education,” says Hitzler. “The Department of Computer Science is extremely supportive of these research efforts in many ways, including funding in the form of graduate teaching assistantships, significant administrative support and support on request for different activities related to AI and data science research and outreach.”
The research in the Department of Computer Science focuses on five core areas, namely cybersecurity, high-assurance software engineering, cyber-physical systems, artificial intelligence and data science, and computer science education. Source: Kansas State University
While Hitzler is busy launching the world’s largest public spatial knowledge graph and organizing symposiums with AI researchers and practitioners, Professor and Peggy and Gary Edwards Chair in Engineering Pavithra Prabhakar is directing the Center for Trustworthy AI-enabled Robotic and Autonomous Systems, or TRAITS.
Her research is on the trustworthiness of robotic and autonomous systems, which are increasingly seeing an infusion of AI-based components due to the promise of enhanced autonomy and resilience. “Our lab focuses on developing mathematics-based rigorous design and analysis techniques with applications in aerospace (NASA supported), automotive (collaboration with Toyota) and agriculture (USDA supported),” she says.
Like Hitzler, Prabhakar joined K-State with years of experience, research and no shortage of awards to lead its research on Cyber-Physical Systems. She’s now the National Science Foundation’s program director in the Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) directorate where she leads and manages programmes in cyber-physical systems, robotics, AI and formal methods. “My portfolio consists of more than 200 projects and principal investigators with a total budget of over US$100 million,” she says.
The Department of Computer Science offers a master’s degree and a doctorate for graduate students, both of which adopt a research approach. Source: Kansas State University
As prolific as she is, Prabhakar never strays from her true mission: providing K-State graduate students with a rigorous background and training to embark on cutting-edge research in this area. Her group has led K-State’s Department of Computer Science to rank No. 10 in the United States in the area of embedded and real-time systems in the last five years.
Not one to squander the immense potential of this field, Prabhakar is always looking to increase the department’s and TRAITS’s capability toward undertaking large-scale projects in AI-enabled safety and security of autonomous systems. This includes forming joint mentorship programs for students and young researchers in this multi-disciplinary field and increasing industrial collaborations. “This will be achieved through regular meetings, dissemination of research through seminars and outreach activities and joint offering of multi-disciplinary courses,” she says.
Prabhakar and Hitzler are by no means the department’s only world-class faculty conducting world-class research and providing world-class education.
There’s also Hande McGinty, assistant professor of computer science, who together with Hitzler, secured more than US$1 million worth of subawards on National Science Foundation grant-funded projects as part of the organization’s work to create the Prototype Open Knowledge Network, or the Proto-OKN program.
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