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In Autumn 2018 my Granddaughter (then 16 months old) became a person with Type 1 Diabetes (T1DM). Why this autoimmune condition occurs is not really clearly understood at present. At that time I could see how my work could be useful in T1DM and so I pivoted away from my Past Work and focused my entire research portfolio (except accessibility) to T1DM, recruiting 8 Doctoral Candidates (including an NHS clinician and NHS Dietitian), creating a multi-disciplinary team across the NHS, Diabetes UK, FBMH, and the Manchester Diabetes Institute; setting up a pipeline for this research by building a start-up in stage 3 with UoMInnovationFactory securing early funding for our initial pilots; and expanding grant income, via a Wellcome Trust Access to Expertise, with NIHR and MRC applicants slated for the end of this year and the beginning of next.
About¶
I am a Professor in Computer Science, Head of Postgraduate Research for Computer Science, a University Senator, a Member of the General Assembly and a member of the University Examinations Board. Professionally, I am a Fellow of the British Computer Soc., a Fellow of the Institute of Engineering Technology, and an Association of Computing Machinery Distinguished Scientist.
My work is centred on understanding, predicting and influencing a user’s behaviour in the real-world and through interfaces and information, while taking into account cognitive, behavioural, perceptual and technological factors. My contributions lie in the development of adaptive user models of extreme users and/or extreme environments.
Grants and Translation¶
I’ve been an Investigator on 19 grants (10 as PI). Having ongoing projects and relationships with: BBC R&D; Google; IBM R&D; Intel; CTIC-Telefonica; Ove Arup Partners; Age Concern; Buttercup Telecommunications; and Docobo, these contributions have not only stayed within the academic community but have made their way into the DNA of the Web via browsers (chromium), software tools (eclipse ACTF) and internationalstandards (W3C UAAG 2.0 / W3C RDWG Symposia). I have led the ACM Special Interest Group on the Web for 2 terms and have led the W3C (the International Standards Body for the Web) Research and Development working group for 4 years making decisions by building consensus when creating web standards (my working being commended as “instrumental to the development of the Web” by Sir Tim Berners Lee).
Past Work¶
My particular interest is in Web Accessibility with specific regard to profound blindness and visual disability. My work is centred around building computational models of human behaviour and includes understanding, predicting, and influencing a user’s interactions and flow through interfaces and information, while taking into account neurophysiological, cognitive, behavioural, perceptual, and technological factors. In this case, my contributions lay along two paths. The first investigates ‘facilitating access and enhancing interactive Web behaviours’, while the second focuses on ‘understanding, evaluating, and modifying the Web experience’.
I co-founded the Web4All Conference Series (now in its 11th Edition) and organised the first four (2004-2007 inc.) as General Chair; Steering Committee – International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility; Steering Committee – International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility; and Steering Committee – International ACM Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia. Programme Chair for ACM ASSETS (2006); Submissions Chair for the WWW Conference (2006) and Accessibility Chair for the 2012 edition; ACM Student Research Competition Grand Finals Judge (2012), General Chair for ACM Hypertext (2007) and ACM ASSETS (2008) and is also a member of the steering committee for these two conferences. I have served on the programme committees, doctoral consortium panels, and review panels for a number of international conferences including ACM HT, WWW, ISWC, ACM CHI, UIST, ACM ASSETS, and ACM SAC. I have guest edited the New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia; Journal of Web Engineering; Journal of Disability and Rehabilitation, and Universal Access in the Information Society. He currently reviews for ACM Transactions on Computer Human Interaction, ACM Transactions on the Web, Elsevier Journal of Web Semantics, and IEEE Internet Computing.
Important
More recent past work involves longitudinally sensing Parkinson’s Disease progression in the wild collaborating with Docobo (SME); and, on the Sentient Tracking Of Parkinson’s project (funded by the Academy of Finland ICT 2023 programme) Along with the University of Oulu Medical Faculty (Dr. Jani Katisko), Carnegie Mellon University (Prof. Anind Dey, Julian Ramos), and the University of Oulu (Prof. Denzil Ferreira). I am also working on coversational interfaces for people with mental health conditions (funded by the EPSRC). In addition, I am a named investigator on the EPSRC - NIHR HTC Partnership Award: Partnership with the MindTech HTC; and I currently lead the NeuroD Network via an EPSRC Connect Health Grant.
I have created collaborations with BBC Research and Development (M Evans and M Glancy); Fundacion CTIC Mobile Research and Development – ‘Telefonica’ (Dr I Marin), and Buttercup Telecoms (names withheld due to NDA) having EPSRC KTA and IAA awards with these companies. Collaborations have also been formed with both IBM T. J. Watson Research Center’s Accessibility Research and Enhanced Web Experience groups (specifically Dr S Trewin, and Dr JT Richards) and IBM Tokyo Research Center’s User Experience and Accessibility Technology group (specifically Dr C Asakawa and Dr H Takagi), and Google (Charles Chen). I am also the research lead to the AcTF. This framework is invaluable as it allows our researchers to build various types of accessibility prototypes, thereby enabling faster experimentation and onward dissemination. Finally, as part of ongoing work I have well formed links with leading edge charities and community groups. These provide different services and currently include: Change People; Henshaws Society for Blind People; Deaf Blind Services (Walthew House); Macclesfield Eye Society; Access SUMMIT; the UoM Disability Support Office; and Age Concern (Trafford). By partnering with these organisations we can guarantee a supply of experiment participants and create stronger links into the community to strengthen future work.
Accomplishments¶
My previous work has resulted in a number of works of significant impact; indeed, ACM President Alexander Wolf described his work as having “singular impacts on the vital field of computing” and his “achievements have had a significant influence on the social, economic and cultural areas of daily lives all over the world”. I am a recipient of the ACM Doug Engelbart prize (2000), the ADDW IBM Research prize (2005), the Microsoft Judges Award at the W4A (2008), and the Best Paper Award at W4A (2010).
I have given invited talks for Middle Eastern Technical University (2019), Nomura Bank (2017), University of the Basque Country (2017), University of York (2016), Pint of Science (2016) CNR Italy Pisa (2015), inclusivedesign24 (2015), Cafe Scientifique (2015), Human Behaviour Network (2014), Loughborough University HCI GuruLecture’ (2013 & 2014), the Technical Superior Insitute, LaSIGE, Lisbon, Portugal (2012); Informatika Fakultatea, UPV-EHU, Spain (2011); Fujitsu Labs Europe (2010); IBM Tokyo Research Laboratory (2009); and keynoted the WebMedia conference (2008).
Important
My first book ‘Web Accessibility: A Foundation for Research’ has for two years ranked in the Amazon - Human Computer Interaction top 40, and in the top 10 for six months after its publication, sold (via download only) 19.1k chapters in its first edition. A second edition has been published as of 2019 with 63000 chapter downloads (to February 2022). My research involves the creation of a number of novel software artefacts, required for experimentation. To preserve their longevity these artefacts are committed back to the community via the eclipse ACTF framework. In this case I am the lead research committer on this project using a General Public Licence under Open Source Software Agreements and in consultation with OSS Watch.
I am a Reviewer for the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, to review for grants in Computer Science (2007-Present); Responsive Mode Panel Member for the UK Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC), 2012 – Reviewer since 2008; Reviewer for the NWO, the Dutch National Research Council, to review for grants in Computer Science (2006-Present).
I am an Associate Editor Journal of Human Computer Studies (Elsevier), Editorial Board Member of Journal of In- teraction Science (Springer); Editorial Board Member of ACM Transactions in Accessible Computing (ACM); and an Editorial Board Member of PLoS One. Further, I have guest edited the New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia; Journal of Web Engineering; Journal of Disability and Rehabilitation, and Universal Access in the Information Society. I currently review for ACM Transactions on Computer Human Interaction, ACM Transactions on the Web, Elsevier Journal of Web Semantics, and IEEE Internet Computing.
I am an Invited Expert – RCUK EPSRC Digital Economy Inclusion Cluster (2009-2011); Invited Expert – European Commission Information Society and Media Directorate-General ICT for Inclusion, eAccessibility and As- sistive Technology, (2011); Invited Expert – EU Challenge 7 ICT 2009 Coordination Action in R&D in Accessible and Assistive ICT (Inclusive Human-Machine Interaction); Consultant – Fujitsu Labs Europe (2006-2010); Research Lead, Eclipse ACTF Project.
I have been coopted to the Tenure and Promotions Committees of McGill University, Canada, 2012; University of Nevada Reno, USA, 2011; NSF Stony Brook University NY, USA, 2011; City University of New York, New York, USA, 2010; IBM Distinguished Engineer case of Dr Chieko Asakawa (IBM TRL Tokyo Japan), 2009; and Adelphi University, New York, USA, 2008.
I have conducted External Doctoral Examinations of (International - Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain) PhD thesis Maria Rauschenberger 2018, (International - Informatika Fakultatea, UPV-EHU, Spain) Examiner for PhD thesis (Amaia Aizpurua) 2017; External (Technical Superior Insitute, LaSIGE, Lisbon) Examiner for PhD thesis (Tiago Guerreiro) 2012; External (Dundee University) - Garreth Tigwell 2019, (Oxford Brookes University) Examiner for PhD thesis (Zaineb Ben Fredj), 2010; External (International - Informatika Fakultatea, UPV-EHU, Spain) Examiner for PhD thesis (Markel Vigo Echebarria), 2009; Examiner (Manchester Business School) for PhD thesis (Abdullah Namoune), 2009; and Internal (School of Computer Science) for PhD thesis (Andrew Brown), 2007.
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