Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Events for January
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NL Seminar-Planning in Creative Contexts
Thu, Jan 09, 2025 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Alex Spangher, USC/ISI , USC/ISI
Talk Title: Planning in Creative Contexts
Abstract: The use of AI in human-centered creative tasks — such as journalism, scientific writing, and storytelling — has showcased their potential for assistance but highlighted a critical gap: planning. "Planning" describes actions performed before (and during) human workflows; "creative" refers to tasks humans execute where the rewards are not clearly defined. I will focus on tasks related to journalism, with specific focus on retrieving a set of sources relevant to a news story. We will show that suggestions made by current AI models do not align with decisions made by humans, and we will show methods for increasing alignment with humans. I will outline a research agenda based on this work to apply such approaches to novel creative tasks.
Biography: Alexander Spangher is pursuing his PhD in computer science at the University of Southern California; he is formerly a writer and data scientist at the New York Times. He focuses on computational journalism and is advised by Jonathan May, Emilio Ferrara and Nanyun Peng. His research is broad and has pursued the following side directions: he has worked at Microsoft Research under the mentorship of Eric Horvitz to detect misinformation. He has collaborated with EleutherAI to build state-of-the-art symbolic music models. Finally, he has collaborated with the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PFSC) to model disruptions in nuclear fusion reactions. His work has received numerous awards: 2 Outstanding Paper Awards at EMNLP 2024, 1 Spotlight Award at ICML 2024, and an Outstanding Paper Award at NAACL 2022. He is fortunate to be supported by a 4-year Bloomberg PhD Fellowship.
Host: Jonathan May and Katy Felkner
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5326/nl-seminar-planning-in-creative-contexts/
Webcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5J_xDsCjZULocation: Information Science Institute (ISI) - Virtual Only
WebCast Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5J_xDsCjZU
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Pete Zamar
Event Link: https://www.isi.edu/events/5326/nl-seminar-planning-in-creative-contexts/
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
CA DREAMS - Technical Seminar Series
Fri, Jan 10, 2025 @ 12:00 PM - 01:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Peter Asbeck, Steve Crago, and Aaron Oki, UCSD, USC/ISI, and Northop Grumman
Talk Title: California DREAMS: RF Microelectronics in Southern California
Series: CA DREAMS - Technical Seminar Series
Abstract: In this talk, we will introduce the California DREAMS hub that is providing prototyping services for RF microelectronics under the DOD’s Microelectronics Commons program. We will provide a history of academic and industrial work in microelectronics in Southern California that includes history of the original MOSIS service and discuss how it led to the formation of California DREAMS. We will describe the hub and its MOSIS 2.0 service, and the progress we have made in our first year and plans for the future.
Biography: Peter Asbeck, UCSDPeter Asbeck is an Emeritus Professor and member of the Center for Wireless Communications at UCSD. He began work at Rockwell Science Center (now Teledyne Scientific) in 1979, and subsequently joined UCSD in 1992. His work has covered GaAs HBT, GaAs FET, GaN FET, and CMOS-SOI devices and circuits, including contributions at some of their early stages of technology development. He is an IEEE Fellow and member of the NAE. Steve Crago, USC/ISISteve Crago is the Director of California DREAMS, an Associate Director of the USC Information Sciences Institute His is located at the Arlington site of ISI, where he has been since 1997. He holds a joint appointment as a Research Associate Professor in the Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research interests include microelectronics lab-to-fab transition, heterogeneous architectures, high-performance and embedded cloud computing, introspective systems, and parallel software. Aaron Oki, Northrop GrummanAaron Oki is the General Manager of the electronics and sensors technologies operating unit and an NG Fellow at Northrop Grumman. Aaron is responsible for developing next generation advanced technology solutions for the nation’s highest priority missions and has 38 years of experience at Northrop Grumman focused on microelectronics, RF and digital electronics. He has over 300 technical publications and 18 U.S. patents. Additionally, Oki has been inducted into the Space Technology Hall of Fame and is a Fellow of the IEEE.
Host: Dr. Steve Crago
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5316/california-dreams-rf-microelectronics-in-southern-california/
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97017422125?pwd=Dbrt8MNMrmBV3xalKQJcAiNsggFJjJ.1&from=addonWebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97017422125?pwd=Dbrt8MNMrmBV3xalKQJcAiNsggFJjJ.1&from=addon
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Amy Kasmir
Event Link: https://www.isi.edu/events/5316/california-dreams-rf-microelectronics-in-southern-california/
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
AI Seminar-Towards Socially Aware and Safe AI Agents
Fri, Jan 17, 2025 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Xuhui Zhou, Carnegie Mellon University
Talk Title: Towards Socially Aware and Safe AI Agents
Series: AI Seminar
Abstract: LLMs are increasingly playing agentic and social roles by interacting with users and tools. I’ll first introduce SOTOPIA, a framework for evaluating LLM social intelligence through interactive simulations. Showing that LLMs struggle with real-world social skills, I will then discuss the crucial role of information asymmetry, highlighting that LLMs cannot properly deal with the information asymmetry that is present in real interactions. Finally, I will introduce HAICosystem, a new framework for simulating and evaluating the safety of LLM agents in user-AI-tool interactions, showcasing the many safety issues that could arise from increasingly autonomous and tool-using agents. I will conclude with some future directions towards safe and socially intelligent LLM agents.
Meeting ID: 933 0676 1471Passcode: 2024
Biography: Xuhui Zhou is a third-year PhD student in Carnegie Mellon University’s Language Technologies Department (CMU LTI) advised by Maarten Sap. His research focuses on making NLP systems socially intelligent, aligning them with human social values. He has presented his work at top-tier NLP and AI conferences, receiving spotlights, and runner-up best paper at ICLR 2024, and EmeCom 2022. Additionally, he has been red-teaming for GPT-4. His work has been covered in the press, including The New York Times, Financial Times, and Marktechpost. He previously organized the workshop on Theory of Mind in Communicating Agents at ICML 2023 and he has served as a reviewer for major conferences, including NeurIPS, ICLR, ACL, EMNLP, etc.
Host: Abel Salinas and Maura Covaci
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5285/towards-socially-aware-and-safe-ai-agents/
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/93306761471?pwd=EnUKnvfrE5WruxuYa1jtx6v7BhznSr.1Location: Information Science Institute (ISI) - Virtual Only
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/93306761471?pwd=EnUKnvfrE5WruxuYa1jtx6v7BhznSr.1
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Pete Zamar
Event Link: https://www.isi.edu/events/5285/towards-socially-aware-and-safe-ai-agents/
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
CA DREAMS - Technical Seminar Series
Fri, Jan 17, 2025 @ 12:00 PM - 01:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Payam Heydari, Professor, University of California, Irvine
Talk Title: Novel Integrated Circuits and Systems Covering Radio-Frequency and Millimeter-Wave
Abstract: This talk will give an overview of all the research projects conducted at UCI’s Nanoscale Communication Integrated Circuits (NCIC) Labs. Topics being covered include (1) Wideband Radars with Excellent Range Resolution and Long-Range Coverage; (2) Wideband RF Receivers with Excellent LO Leakage Cancellation; (3) End-to-End Transceivers for 6G and Beyond; (4) High-Performance Frequency Synthesis.
Biography: Payam Heydari is currently the Henry Samueli Faculty Excellence Professor and the University Chancellor’s Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of California, Irvine. He is the (co)-author of two books, three book chapters, and more than 190 journal and conference papers. He has given Keynote Speech to IEEE GlobalSIP 2013 Symposium on Millimeter Wave Imaging and Communications, served as Invited Distinguished Speaker to the 2014 IEEE Midwest Symp. on Circuits and Systems, and gave a Tutorial at the 2017 International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC). He has served as Distinguished Lecturer of both the IEEE Solid-State Circuits Society (SSCS) (2014-2016) and the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (MTT-S) (2019-2022). Dr. Heydari is a fellow of National Academy of Inventors and a fellow of IEEE. He is the co-recipient of the 2024 IEEE Circuits and Systems Society Darlington Best Paper Award, and is the recipient of the 2023 IEEE Microwave Theory and Technology Society (MTT-S) Distinguished Educator Award, the 2021 IEEE Solid-State Circuits Society (SSCS) Innovative Education Award, and Best Invited Paper Award at the 2021 IEEE Custom Integrated Circuits Conference. He was selected as the inaugural Faculty Innovation Fellow by the University of California, Irvine (UCI) Beall Applied Innovation. He was the recipient of the 2016-2017 UCI School of Engineering Mid-Career Excellence in Research, the 2014 Distinguished Engineering Educator Award from Orange County Engineering Council, the 2009 Business Plan Competition First Place Prize Award and Best Concept Paper Award both from Paul Merage School of Business at UC-Irvine, the 2010 Faculty of the Year Award from UC-Irvine’s Engineering Student Council (ECS), the 2009 School of Engineering Fariborz Maseeh Best Faculty Research Award, the 2007 IEEE Circuits and Systems Society Guillemin-Cauer Award, the 2005 IEEE Circuits and Systems Society Darlington Best Paper Award, the 2005 National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award, the 2005 Henry Samueli School of Engineering Teaching Excellence Award, the Best Paper Award at the 2000 IEEE Int’l Conference on Computer Design (ICCD), and the 2001 Technical Excellence Award from the Association of Professors and Scholars of Iranian Heritage (APSIH). He was recognized as the 2004 Outstanding Faculty in the EECS Department of the University of California, Irvine. His research on novel low-power multi-purpose multi-antenna RF front-ends received the Low-Power Design Contest Award at the 2008 IEEE Int’l Symposium on Low-Power Electronics and Design (ISLPED). Dr. Heydari is an Associate Editor (AE) of IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits (JSSC), IEEE Open Journal of Solid-State Circuits Society (OJ-SSCS), and was an AE of IEEE Solid-State Circuits Letters (SSC-L) and IEEE Trans. on Circuits and Systems - Regular Papers. He serves on the Technical Program Committe (TPC) of the IEEE International Microwave Symposium, and was a TPC member of IEEE European Solid-State Circuits Conference (ESSCIRC), ISSCC, and CICC. He is the director of the Nanoscale Communication IC (NCIC) Labs.
Host: Dr. Steve Crago
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5310/novel-integrated-circuits-and-systems-covering-radio-frequency-and-millimeter-wave/
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97017422125?pwd=Dbrt8MNMrmBV3xalKQJcAiNsggFJjJ.1&from=addonWebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97017422125?pwd=Dbrt8MNMrmBV3xalKQJcAiNsggFJjJ.1&from=addon
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Amy Kasmir
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
NL Seminar-Inductive Biases for Data- and Parameter-Efficient Transfer Learning
Thu, Jan 23, 2025 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Mozhdeh Gheini, USC/ISI, USC/ISI
Talk Title: Inductive Biases for Data- and Parameter-Efficient Transfer Learning
Abstract: THIS TALK WILL "NOT" BE RECORDED, PLEASE WATCH LIVE OR ATTEND IN PERSON. https://usc.zoom.us/j/95381979100?pwd=yKkC6snFuqRddSnRCEwnVWvtP9ZdCX.1 Meeting ID: 953 8197 9100Passcode: 911377 Data- and resource-intensive pre-training and fine-tuning applied upon Transformer-based models is the dominant paradigm at the forefront of rapid advancements in natural language processing, human language technologies, and most notably, large language models. Such reliance on massive amounts of data, computation, and energy, while effective and impressive from a performance-only perspective, can hinder open, nonexclusive, and sustainable development of these technologies. In this talk, we present how certain inductive biases can be devised to adjust current natural language methods under resource-constrained scenarios and provide insights into why the proposed inductive biases are successful in such cases. Specifically, we discuss four research directions on data and parameter efficiency of fine-tuning and transfer learning in natural language processing: (1) a universal regimen that creates a single pre-trained checkpoint suitable for machine translation transfer to practically any language pair and eliminates the need for ad hoc pre-training; (2) an architecture-guided parameter-efficient fine-tuning method that performs competitively with full fine-tuning while exclusively updating cross-attention parameters; (3) an analysis of Mega, a recently introduced augmentation of the Transformer architecture to incorporate explicit recency bias, through the lens of transfer learning; and (4) a meta-learning algorithm to prime pre-trained models for specific fine-tuning strategies. Combined with ablations that show how they are effective and analyses that demonstrate their generalizability, these directions are meant to serve as tools for resource-efficient transfer learning for natural language processing.
Biography: Mozhdeh "Mo" Gheini is a PhD candidate at the University of Southern California advised by Jonathan May. Her PhD focus has been on investigating different inductive biases to build data- and parameter-efficient methods for transfer learning for natural language processing tasks like machine translation and beyond. She has also spent three summers interning with Apple, where she will be joining again in February as Machine Learning Research Engineer.
Host: Jonathan May and Katy Felkner
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5379/inductive-biases-for-data-and-parameter-efficient-transfer-learning/
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/95381979100?pwd=yKkC6snFuqRddSnRCEwnVWvtP9ZdCX.1Location: Information Science Institute (ISI) - Virtual and ISI-Conf Rm#689
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/95381979100?pwd=yKkC6snFuqRddSnRCEwnVWvtP9ZdCX.1
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Pete Zamar
Event Link: https://www.isi.edu/events/5379/inductive-biases-for-data-and-parameter-efficient-transfer-learning/
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
AI Seminar-Evaluating Text to Image Platforms Content Moderation During the 2024 US Presidential Election
Fri, Jan 31, 2025 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Information Sciences Institute
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Kevin Greene, Princeton University, Princeton University
Talk Title: Evaluating Text to Image Platforms Content Moderation During the 2024 US Presidential Election
Series: AI Seminar
Abstract: Join Zoom Meeting: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96982313329?pwd=rZkvQ5qgBMsQfY3MjZgn4WrOJTOJjp.1 Meeting ID: 969 8231 3329 Passcode: 853171 Register in advance for this webinar: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_erWJIqKDSzifVzFRoezM5A How do generative AI platforms’ content moderation policies handle the creation of political deepfakes? There are considerable concerns about the risks posed by AI generated images of political leaders, but no systematic evaluation detailing how AI platforms address this outcome. We leverage an automated pipeline to extract and transform references to individuals on the US Presidential tickets from prominent media into prompts for generative AI systems, enabling politically diverse, externally valid evaluations. These prompts are sent to three prominent T2I platforms each week for the final three months of the 2024 US Presidential election. First, we show that the platforms take different approaches to content moderation. These differences contribute to there being low agreement in blocking behavior between platforms. Second, there is little consistency in the blocking behavior within platforms over time. Stability AI allowed almost all prompts featuring political figures until a sudden change two weeks before the 2024 election. Further, almost no prompts were blocked in every week of our collection. Our findings highlight the importance of developing scalable context specific approaches to monitoring text-to-image platforms.
Biography: Kevin T. Greene is an Academic Research Manager in the Empirical Studies of Conflict project at Princeton University leading the Digital Conflict and Information Integrity project. He studies the role of information and information communication technologies in international and domestic politics. Ongoing projects investigate the spread of unreliable content from algorithmic recommendations, the social and political risks posed by generative AI, and the strategies employed by foreign influence operations. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Labs and Microsoft and published in Science Advances, PNAS Nexus, American Political Science Review, Political Analysis, the Journal of Politics, and Political Communication among others. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, Lockheed Martin Advanced Technology Labs and Microsoft and published in Science Advances, PNAS Nexus, American Political Science Review, Political Analysis, the Journal of Politics, and Political Communication among others.
Host: Zhuoyu Shi and Pete Zamar
More Info: https://www.isi.edu/events/5317/evaluating-text-to-image-platforms-content-moderation-during-the-2024-us-presidential-election/
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96982313329?pwd=rZkvQ5qgBMsQfY3MjZgn4WrOJTOJjp.1Location: Information Science Institute (ISI) - Virtual Only
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96982313329?pwd=rZkvQ5qgBMsQfY3MjZgn4WrOJTOJjp.1
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Pete Zamar
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor.
