Faculty

John Riedl

My research focus is on collaborative systems that support human interaction through computer systems. My career goal is to understand how to develop and apply computer technology to the problems of human organizations. One of the biggest such problems is getting the right information to the right people. The Internet has democratized the publishing process. Now, anyone who wants can publish anything they want, just by creating a Web site. We humans are hopelessly overmatched by the increasing volumes of information that are published. Collaborative filtering is a technology that enables us to all work together to sift through the millions of documents on any topic to find those that are most appropriate for each of us. Collaborative filtering works by learning which kinds of documents each of us likes, and finding other people who share out interests. We are working on improving collaborative filtering by extending the amount and type of information it presents to users, the range of interfaces that it supports, and the other types of filtering algorithms with which it can be combined. For instance, we have explored ways to create explanations of collaborative filtering recommendations so users can understand why documents were recommended to them. We are also exploring community interfaces to collaborative filtering, which have the potential to strengthen the relationships between people in a group by helping them discover what they have in common with others in the group. We have also looked at communities in which some members of the community are not people, but are information filtering agents helping the people work more effectively. Across our entire research program, our goal is to understand how computers can be used to help people process information more efficiently, and work together better.

Joseph A. Konstan

I am interested in a wide range of topics under the general category of Human-Computer Interaction. Most of my current work involves computer systems and interfaces to address information overload. The GroupLens project (www.grouplens.org) is exploring recommender systems that combine the opinions of a community to help each individual find useful information. Other projects are exploring multimedia authoring tools and Web task automation tools. I am also interested in the more general relationship between computer interfaces and human social behavior.

Loren Terveen

My research interests are human-computer interaction and computer-mediated communication. I have done research in specific areas such as collaborative filtering, web search and information management, intelligent interfaces, organizational memory, and visualization. There's one problem I'm most interested in - using technology to help people create and develop strong social ties. I want to help people form communities based on shared interests. And I want to help members of local and institutional communities develop stronger connections. To pursue this goal, I'm guided by two research themes. Combining information and social spaces. I want to create online spaces where users interact with information (content) and other people - a simple example might be a music environment where people can both listen to music and find and interact with other people with similar tastes in music. I'm also interested in techniques for extracting information from records of people's online social activity - for example, extracting recommendations of web pages from Usenet messages. Combining physical and virtual interaction. I'm convinced that building strong social connections requires face-to-face, in-person interaction, that electronic communication alone just won't do the job. So I'm interested in ways to use electronic communication to enhance and strengthen existing communities whose members already have some face-to-face contact. I'm also interested in the use of mobile and location-aware devices that can integrate interaction in physical and virtual space.

Ph.D. Students

Shilad Sen

I am a doctoral candidate who wants to improve online communities by paying better attention to the information users give us.

My specific interests range from collaborative filtering algorithms research, to intelligent displays of user-created tags. I particularly like building software systems, applying data mining and machine learning techniques on huge data sets, and writing software apps that touch a large number of users.

When I'm not computing, I play my saxophone in Snowblind

Shyong K. (Tony) Lam

Sara Drenner

My area of interest is Computer-Human Interaction. I'm currently working with other researchers from GroupLens, the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and Carnegie Mellon University. This work aims to bridge social science and computer science, using social science theories to inspire interface design. This work has several interesting applications, especially in the area of online communities.

Mikhil Masli

Broadly, I am interested in enabling common people to make it easier to use computers by reducing the amount of adjustment they need to put in. Specifically, I plan to investigate maps and how make them of most use to people whilst causing as little pain and frustration as possible.

Ken Reily

I am an Advanced Software Specialist for 3M Track and Trace Solutions and an instructor of Information and Decision Sciences in the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota. As a technologist and business person, I have played a key role in several new business development programs at 3M inclding 3M's RFID File Tracking, RFID Specment Tracking, and RFID anti-counterfeiting technology. Prior to my current role with 3M I held positions with Cargill, Inc. and Microsoft. At Microsoft, I contributed to the development of the original .NET platform through their Joint Development Program. At Cargill, I was a subsystem designer for the Lynx application, a global grain origination system.

In addition to my professional work, I have published a number of academic papers regarding tracking, mapping, and mobile applications. I have also been invited to speak in various forums about topics such as RFID tracking and information management in health care, and using Elliptic Curve Cryptography to combat pharmaceutical counterfeiting.

I have a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota. In addition to my ongoing role in new business development for 3M, I continue to do research in Computer Science at the University of Minnesota where I am completing my dissertation for a Ph.D.

Max Harper

I am a doctoral candidate who is interested in when, how, and why people help one another via networked technology, such as Yahoo! Answers, and the design/interface of these websites. Prior to coming to the University of Minnesota, I attended Carleton College and worked as a software developer in Seattle and Denver. I used to be a competitive swimmer and ultimate player: these days I've taken to skiing and squash. I make pizza every week, religiously.

Reid Priedhorsky

I am interested broadly in the use of technology to solve social problems created by the modernization of human life.

Currently, my work centers around wikis, especially geowikis, which are the fusion of wikis with geographic information systems. I study the social dynamics of people using wikis and the consequences of these relationships.

In my spare time, I enjoy bicycling, reading, hiking and backpacking (especially in the mountains and deserts of the American West), tinkering and building things, and general hacking and programming.

Katie Panciera

I am interested in understanding and explaining who is creating/destroying content on Wikipedia as well as evaluating public health information on Wikipedia. I graduated from Berea College in 2005 with degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. In 2006, I was awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

Jilin Chen

My research interest is in understanding online communities and using machine learning technologies to help solve their problems.

Aaron Halfaker

Vinod Krishnan

I am interested in finding ways to enhance the quality of interaction of
users of recommender systems. AS part of this, I am exploring how users
differ from recommender systems when it comes to recommending to other
users - what humans are particularly good at, and not good at. Finding out
these differences can help find ways to compliment human strengths and
compensate their weaknesses.

I enjoy designing GUIs and reading about the psychology of human-computer
interaction. On the creative side, I enjoy composing music and verse and
finding new ways to tackle my opponents in badminton.

Aditya Pal

I am a doctoral candidate at University of Minnesota and my research interest includes social network analysis and studying online communities

Jeff Beck

Brand new to the lab, Jeff is interested in online communities.

Master's Students

S. Andrew Sheppard

I am interested in all technical aspects of the Internet and World Wide Web, with a focus on building and growing collaborative websites. My current GroupLens project is tag synonym detection. I am also interested in data visualization, and am studying third-year Japanese.

Undergraduates

Staff Software Engineer

Rich Davies

Program Specialist

Angela Brandt

Alumni

Gabriel Aguirre, BS
Rahul Akolkar
Istvan Albert
Irfan Ali, MS
George Atendido
Patrick Baudisch (for a summer)
Al Borchers, MS
Mike Cassano
Ed H. Chi, PhD
Josh Chu
Dan Cosley, PhD
Dan Frankowski
Irene From
Prateep Gopalkrishnan
Catherine S. Guetzlaff, MS
Nathan Good, BS
Tara Gustafson
Jon Herlocker, PhD
Hannu Huhdanpaa
Junzo Kamahara
Nishikant Kapoor
Hae Young Kim, BS
Daniel Lewandowski
David Leppik
Timothy Lee, BS
Pam Ludford, PhD
David Maltz
Sean M. McNee, PhD
Brad Miller, PhD
Mark O'Connor, MS
Jisu Oh, MS
Jeremy Osterhouse, BS
Al Mamunur Rashid, PhD
Paul Resnick
Anna Rouben, MS
J. Ben Schafer, PhD
Badrul Sarwar, PhD
Max Schuchard, BS
Hongguo (Tim) Tian, MS
Roberto Torres
Venkateswaran (Venkat) Udaysankar
Kurt Wilms, BS
Scott Yilek
Changqing Zhou
Cai-Nicolas Ziegler
Tom Zielund, MS
Darryl Zurn, BS