Professor Max Bramer

Professor Max Bramer

Emeritus Professor of Information Technology, University of Portsmouth, UK
Honorary Secretary, International Federation for Information Processing
Chair, British Computer Society Specialist Group on Artificial Intelligence

Research

Actively involved in research in Artificial Intelligence since the 1970s. Current research interests include data mining (in particular the automatic derivation of classification rules from examples), case-based reasoning, model-based approaches to diagnostic reasoning and methodologies for knowledge engineering.

	Previously (before retirement) leader of the University of Portsmouth's Artificial Intelligence Research Group Artificial Intelligence Research Group Partial List of Projects (under development)

	Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining

	Knowledge-Based and Expert Systems

	Model-Based Reasoning Technical Director for FAUST, an early multi-organisation 'large demonstrator' project, which introduced Artificial Intelligence techniques to the UK electricity industry. FAUST (Fault Analysis Using Simulation and Testing) diagnosed faults on the high-voltage electricity distribution network in real-time from partial and often unreliable telemetry. The system applied a combination of heuristic and model-based reasoning to an object-orientated model of the distribution network, within an overall Blackboard architecture.

	Computers and Chess Especially the application of declarative knowledge to endgames (sub-games with a small number of pieces), the automatic derivation of endgame 'databases' indicating perfect play in every position and the automatic generation of human-understandable strategies from such databases.

	History of Artificial Intelligence Especially the 'pre-history' of AI before 1956, the mechanisation of games (chess, checkers, nim etc.) from the 18th century onwards and AI in Britain from Turing up to the Alvey Programme in the 1980s. Invited lectures on 'Artificial Intelligence in Fact and Fiction: the First 3,000 Years' at the IFIP World Computer Congress 2006 (Santiago, Chile) and AI-2006 (Cambridge, UK).

	External Lectures Over 150 external lectures, seminars, etc. presented on a variety of topics, principally concerning Artificial Intelligence, Data Mining, Knowledge-Based Systems and the use of computers in education, to a range of audiences, including academics in Computer Science (and other disciplines), computer professionals, teachers and senior Local Education Authority staff, undergraduate and postgraduate students, and both technical and general management. These include lectures in Denmark, Canada, Holland, Spain, Japan, the Republic of Ireland, Yugoslavia, France, Germany, the United States, China, Finland, Poland, Bulgaria, Greece, Chile and Australia.

	Research Students Supervised (under development)