We are focusing on building connections with the local AI ecosystem, fostering collaboration and knowledge-sharing.

Ideal for industry, tech professionals, students and faculty members working/interested in the field of AI. We invite you to register and be a part of this meaningful conversation.

We are looking for submissions for poster presentations that cover, but are not limited to, any combination of the following topics:

• Fundamentals of AI and Machine Learning
• Ethical Considerations in AI
• AI in Healthcare
• AI in Oceans and Environmental Science
• AI in Agriculture
• AI in Law
• Law and Regulation of AI
• AI in Finance and Economics
• Natural Language Processing
• Computer Vision
• Robotics and Autonomous Systems
• AI in Education
• Data Science and Big Data Analytics
• AI for Social Good
• AI in Arts and Entertainment
• Human-Computer Interaction and AI
• AI and Cybersecurity
• Other topics in AI and deep learning

Submission guidelines:

• Abstracts should be a maximum of 500 words, clearly outlining the research question, methodology, contributions, results or other findings, and implications for the field of AI.
• Each submission must indicate the primary topic from the list above.
• Authors should ensure their abstracts are concise, comprehensive, and written in English.
• Submissions may have been published and presented previously or be under consideration for publication while being evaluated for this symposium -- we are not an archival event.
• If you already have a PDF of your proposed poster (with approximate dimensions 121.92 x 91.44 cm), please upload that, as well.
• If your abstract is accepted, you will be required to register for the event in order to present your poster.

Submission Deadline: 24 April 2024 anywhere on Earth

How to submit:

• Please submit your abstracts through the following link: OpenReview
• Submission reviews are ‘double-blind’, so avoid using identifying information in the abstract itself. You can include references to existing work, however, ensure that these are not in the first-person.
• Submissions will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and early submission is encouraged. Accepted abstracts will be presented as posters during the symposium, providing a unique opportunity to showcase your work to the local AI community.
• For any inquiries regarding the submission process or the Symposium, please contact us at dais24@dal.ca. We look forward to your contributions!

Keynote speakers:

• 

  Why AI Is W.E.I.R.D. And Shouldn't Be This Way

  Rada Mihalcea, Janice M. Jenkins Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Michigan; Director of the Michigan Artificial Intelligence Lab

  Rada Mihalcea is the Janice M. Jenkins Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan and the Director of the Michigan Artificial Intelligence Lab. Her research interests are in computational linguistics, with a focus on lexical semantics, multilingual natural language processing, and computational social sciences. She serves or has served on the editorial boards of the Journals of Computational Linguistics, Language Resources and Evaluations, Natural Language Engineering, Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, IEEE Transactions on Affective Computing, and Transactions of the Association for Computational Linguistics. She was a program co-chair for EMNLP 2009 and ACL 2011, and a general chair for NAACL 2015 and *SEM 2019. She is an ACM Fellow, a AAAI Fellow, and served as ACL President (2018-2022 Vice/Past). She is the recipient of a Sarah Goddard Power award (2019) for her contributions to diversity in science, an honorary citizen of her hometown of Cluj-Napoca, Romania (2013), and the recipient of a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers awarded by President Obama (2009).

• 

  Reinforcement Learning for Therapeutics

  Doina Precup, Canada-CIFAR AI Chair; Associate Professor, School of Computer Science, McGill University; Mila Research Director, Google DeepMind Montreal

  Doina Precup splits her time between McGill University / Mila, where she co-directs the Reasoning and Learning Lab, and Google DeepMind, where she is a Research Director and co-founder of the Montreal research team. Her research interests are in the areas of reinforcement learning, deep learning, reasoning under uncertainty, and diverse applications of machine learning, with a focus on health care. Dr. Precup is Senior Fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research since 2017, and was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 2022. Dr. Precup is also involved in activities supporting the organization of the wider Quebec and Canadian AI ecosystems. She served as chair of the National Program Committee of the Pan-Canadian AI strategy. Dr. Precup is also passionate about including under-represented groups in machine learning. For this purpose, she co-founded the AI4Good lab, an initiative aimed at attracting more women to the machine learning field, while developing applications with positive social impact.

Invited talk speakers:

• Tara Sampalli, Senior Director, Implementation Science and Evaluation, and Global Health Systems Planning, Research, Innovation & Discovery, Nova Scotia Health

  Dr. Sampalli is the Senior Director, Implementation Science, Evaluation and Global Health Systems in Nova Scotia Health and Health Innovation Hub. She has held multiple important roles at Nova Scotia Health and has made significant contributions in each of these roles. In her current role, she leads the Implementation Science Team, and the Network of Scholars and is working with many key partners in the province to support the Learning Health System strategy. Tara also holds an Assistant Professor position at the Faculty of Medicine at Dalhousie University.

  Through her many roles in the organization, Tara has been instrumental in supporting multiple priority initiatives that have gone on to win provincial, national, and international quality awards. She has also secured numerous research grants and published several key articles related to health system improvements and transformations. She has a deep passion for working with patients and community partners.

  Tara is currently leading and co-leading several priority implementations and innovations including technology and digital innovations such as Virtual Care Nova Scotia, Virtual Urgent Care, Virtual Emergency Care, and team-based models of care such as Mobile Primary Care, Pharmacy Clinics and many other initiatives that are bringing care closer to home / in your community initiatives. She is also the lead for the Nova Scotia’s International Community of Health Care Workers Engagement (NICHE) Program for internationally educated and trained professionals in the province. Tara is also one of the leads heading up the AI Centre of Excellence in the province.

• Scott McKenna, Chief Information Officer at Nova Scotia Health Authority and IWK Health

  Scott McKenna started as Nova Scotia Health’s Chief Information Officer (CIO) in October 2022. Scott came to Nova Scotia Health from his role as Chief Information Officer for both Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada, having spent the majority of his 32 year career working for federal government at the national level.

  As Chief Information Officer for Nova Scotia Health Authority, Scott champions the Digital Health Strategy, is a senior leader on our One Person One Record team, and responsible for the planning and execution of the Information Management and Information Technology (IM/IT) strategy and operations. He also provides leadership and support to the IWK. Scott collaborates across the health and digital sectors with internal and external partners to create and achieve our digital health strategy.

  As CIO with Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada, he led the development and delivery of their first digital strategy in the modernization of program delivery. He also led the development and execution of Health Canada’s data strategy as well as facilitated and enabled programs in developing business solutions through their Innovation Hub. He was responsible for enhancing and maintaining all infrastructure, development and delivery of applications, and working with partners across government to enable the two lead departments in the Government of Canada’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  Scott has significant background in health services and navigating complex public sector infrastructure across Canada, developing a vision for digital, modernization and innovation while leading people and culture through transformational change initiatives. He brings leadership depth, developing digital and IM/IT strategy and ensuring it is aligned with the overall business strategy of the organization while leading the delivery of diverse operational areas to ensure IM/IT services are available to our teams and partners.