News Story

KMi at the ISWS 2022 Summer School

Agnese Chiatti, Friday 15 Jul 2022

During the 3rd-9th July KMi’s Agnese Chiatti, Paula Reyero Lobo, Angel Pavon Perez, and John Domingue attended the International Semantic Web Research Summer School (ISWS 2022) which was held in a castle in the small medieval hilltop town of Bertinoro, Italy.

ISWS is held in the University Residential Center and is a well-known opportunity to learn from mentors and peers, network and have fun! ISWS offers the opportunity to learn more about current topics, trends, and applications of Semantic Web technologies, while allowing participants to exchange ideas and gain some feedback about their PhD research.

KMi Director John Domingue was a Tutorial Speaker at the event, where he explored how decentralised technologies such as blockchains and Solid (from Sir Tim Berners-Lee) can empower citizens to take control of their data.

Agnese Chiatti, Paula Reyero Lobo and Angel Pavon Perez attended ISWS as participants, and presented their doctoral research works during the poster session: Agnese presented “RAVI: a Robotic Architecture for Visual Intelligence”, Angel presented Bias in AI models in financial services and Bias in Toxicity Detection alongside Paula.

All participants wanted to thank those involved with the tutorials, keynotes, and in-depth pill sessions that the school had to offer, the students learned the key concepts and current challenges of the many sub-fields of the Semantic Web, including but not limited to Knowledge Graph engineering, Blockchain, and NLP. They were also challenged to work in teams with people they had not met prior to the event, and to come up with novel ideas to tackle a specific research question, as well as to produce a paper and a presentation illustrating their ideas, in just a few days.

Agnese was part of the team who placed first in the overall ranking, after considering participation and outcomes of the different activities. Ángel was part of the team who placed second in the best paper ranking. Paula was part of the team who placed second in the best presentation ranking, and third in the best team ranking.

Alongside professional development, our fellow KMiers were able to go through a lot of personal development, through the daily yoga workouts, riddles, or socialising by the pool. They even put on their dancing shoes and enjoyed a surprise Swing dance class that took place in the main village square!!