News of the IDM Lab

2023

• Alumna Jiaoyang Li (now a professor) received an ICAPS Best Dissertation Award 2023 and the Victor Lesser Distinguished Dissertation Award 2023 by the International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent System (IFAAMAS, that runs the AAMAS Conference). Congratulations!
• Alumna Jiaoyang Li (now a professor) received the USC Viterbi School of Engineering best dissertation award, called the William F. Ballhaus, Jr. Prize for Excellence in Graduate Engineering Research. Thanks William Ballhaus, and congratulations Jiaoyang!
• Our paper "A. Nash, K. Daniel, S. Koenig and A. Felner, Theta*: Any-Angle Path Planning on Grids, AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), 2007" received the 2023 Classic Paper ("Test of Time") Award of AAAI. Thanks AAAI!
• Our paper "T. Huang, V. Shivashankar, M. Caldara, J. Durham, J. Li, B. Dilkina, and S. Koenig, Deadline-Aware Multi-Agent Tour Planning, Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), 2023" received the ICAPS-23 Best Student Paper Honorable Mention. Congratulations to Taoan and all his co-authors!
• Our research group co-organizes the League of Robot Runners, a MAPF competition. Thanks to all participants, organizers, and our sponsor Amazon Robotics!
• Sven co-organized the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS) 2023 as program co-chair. Thanks to all authors, the 22 SPC members, and the 191 PC members!
• Ben-Gurion University invited Sven for a one-month visit. Thanks to our collaborators at Ben-Gurion University and the Technion for hosting the visit!
• We received Amazon Research Award (ARA) equivalent funding from Amazon. Thanks Amazon Robotics!
• The IDM-lab hosted professor Roman Bartak (Charles University, Czech Republic) as research visitor. Thank you for visiting!

2022

• Our paper "E. Boyarski, S.-H. Chan, D. Atzmon, A. Felner and S. Koenig, On Merging Agents in Multi-Agent Pathfinding Algorithms, Proceedings of the Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), 2022" received the SoCS-22 Best Student Paper Award. Congratulations to Eli, Shao-Hung, Dor, and Ariel!
• Our group members got four papers accepted to the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) despite an acceptance rate of only 14.96 percent. Congratulations everyone!
• Ph.D. student Jiaoyang Li accepted an offer as Assistant Professor at Carnegie Mellon University. Congratulations! More than one third of our Ph.D. students have now accepted tenure-track positions in academia (and are still professors).
• Ph.D. student Shao-Hung Chan received a research fellowship from Ben-Gurion University to visit the research group of Prof. Ariel Felner for six months. Congratulations!
• Undergraduate student Shuyang (Jessie) Zhang received a Computer Science Award for Outstanding Research. Her research will be published in SoCS 2022. Congratulations to Jessie, Jiaoyang, Taoan, and Bistra!
• Undergraduate student Yutong Li received a Provost's Research Fellowship for Summer 2022. Congratulations!
• Visiting undergraduate student Cheng Ge published his research in ICAPS 2023, mentored by Ph.D. student Han Zhang. He chose MIT to pursue a Ph.D. degree. Congratulations to Cheng and Han!
• Sven became Dean's Professor. Thanks to the Dean and USC!
• The IDM-lab hosted professor Carlos Hernandez (Universidad San Sebastian, Chile), professor Pavel Surynek (Czech Technical University, Czech Republic), graduate student Orazio Rillo (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne = EPFL) and undergraduate student Cheng Ge (Tsinghua University, China). Thank you for visiting!
• We received an Amazon Research Award (ARA). Thanks Amazon Robotics!

2021

• Our group members got four papers accepted to the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) despite an acceptance rate of only 21.39 percent. Congratulations everyone!
• Our system demonstration "Scalable Rail Planning and Replanning: Winning the 2020 Flatland Challenge" received the most audience votes for the system demonstration award at the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS) 2021. The video is lots of fun! Congratulations to Jiaoyang, Yi, Shao-Hung, and Mike as well as their other advisors!
• Alumnus Hang Ma (now a professor) received the ICAPS Best Dissertation Award 2021. He was also runner-up for the Victor Lesser Distinguished Dissertation Award 2020 by the International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent System (IFAAMAS, that runs the AAMAS Conference). Congratulations!
• An updated version of the software that won the Flatland challenge in 2020 won again in the extended Flatland competition in 2021. Congratulations to Jiaoyang, Yi, Shao-Hung, and Mike as well as their other advisors! This year, Mike did almost all of the work. A special shout-out to him!
• Undergraduate student Shuyang (Jessie) Zhang was a CURVE Symposium winner for her poster on "Machine Learning-Guided Prioritized Planning for Multi-Agent Path Finding." Congratulations to Jessie, Jiaoyang, and Taoan!
• Ph.D. student Jiaoyang Li received a Computer Science Best Research Assistant Award. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Jiaoyang Li received a WISE Merit Award. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Jiaoyang Li proposed her dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Sven became a fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). Thanks ACM!
• Sven was invited to serve on the council of the Computing Community Consortium (CCC) of the Computing Research Association. Thanks CCC!
• We received an Amazon Research Award (ARA). Thanks Amazon Robotics!

2020

• Team An_Old_Driver, consisting of three of our Ph.D. students plus one student from Monash University, used multi-agent path-finding technology to reach the highest score in both rounds of the NeurIPS-20 Flatland Challenge, a railway scheduling competition which was held in partnership with German and Swiss railway companies. They outperformed all other entries in both tracks, including all reinforcement learning entries, to win overall first place in both rounds. According to the organizers, there were more than 700 participants from 51 countries making more than 2,000 submissions, see here for more information and here for the USC press release. Congratulations to Jiaoyang, Yi, Shao-Hung, and Mike!
• Our paper "H. Zhang, J. Li, P. Surynek, S. Koenig and S. Kumar, Multi-Agent Path Finding with Mutex Propagation, Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), 2020" received the ICAPS-20 Outstanding Student Paper Award. Congratulations to Han, Jiaoyang, Pavel, and Satish!
• Our paper "H. Xu, K. Sun, S. Koenig and S. Kumar, Decision-Tree Learning-Inspired Dynamic Variable Ordering for the Weighted CSP, Proceedings of the Symposium on Combinatorial Search (SoCS), 2020" received the SoCS-20 Best Paper Honorable Mention. (There were one winner and one honorable mention.) Congratulations to Hong, Kexuan, and Satish!
• Our class project on multi-agent path finding was chosen as Model AI Assignment by the Symposium on Educational Advances in Artificial Intelligence. Congratulations to Wolfgang and Jiaoyang!
• Our paper "J. Li, A. Tinka, S. Kiesel, J. Durham, S. Kumar and S. Koenig, Lifelong Multi-Agent Path Finding in Large-Scale Warehouses, Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS), 2020", which is joint work with Amazon Robotics, received press coverage, including in the ACM TechNews. Congratulations to Jiaoyang, Andrew, Scott, Joey, and Satish!
• Ph.D. student Jiaoyang Li was awarded a WiSE Qualcomm Top-Off Fellowship. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Liron Cohen defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Sven became a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Thanks IEEE!
• Sven was elected to the AAAS Steering Group of the Information, Computing, and Communication section as member-at-large. Thanks AAAS members!
• Sven was elected to the Board of Directors of the International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (IFAAMAS). Thanks IFAAMAS members and AAMAS attendees!
• Sven was offered a Lady Davis Visiting Professorship at the Technion (Israel Institute of Technology). Thanks to all colleagues at the Technion! Unfortunately, it looks like the COVID-19 pandemic might prevent me from visiting.
• We received Amazon Research Award (ARA) equivalent funding from Amazon. Thanks Amazon Robotics!
• The IDM-lab hosted graduate student Yoni Sher (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel) as research visitor. Thank you for visiting!

2019

• Our multi-agent path-finding team (a joint venture between AI and robotics) received a Technology Commercialization Award from the USC Stevens Center for Innovation Technology. Congratulations to Nora, Satish, Hang, Hong, Jiaoyang, Liron, Tansel, and Wolfgang!
• Master's student Jiangxing Wang received the Best Research Award from the Computer Science Department. His research was published in AAMAS 2019. Congratulations to Jiangxing and Satish!
• Our group members got four papers accepted to the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) despite an acceptance rate of only 16.21 percent. Congratulations everyone!
• Our paper "S. Koenig and M. Likhachev, D* Lite, Proceedings of the AAAI Conference of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), 2002" received the 2019 Classic Paper ("Test of Time") Honorable Mention of AAAI. (There were one winner and one honorable mention.) Thanks AAAI!
• Ph.D. student Hang Ma became an assistant professor at Simon Fraser University. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Tansel Uras defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Monash University invited Sven for a three-week visit. Thanks to all collaborators there, especially from their optimization group!
• We received an Amazon Research Award (ARA). Thanks Amazon Robotics!
• The IDM-lab hosted Dr. Jihee Han (Korea University, Korea) and graduate student Moli Yang (University of Melbourne, Australia) as research visitors. Thank you for visiting!

2018

• Master's student Kexuan (Kiana) Sun received the Best Research Award from the Computer Science Department. Her research was published in CPAIOR 2018. She chose USC to pursue a Ph.D. degree. Congratulations to Kexuan, Satish, and Hong!
• Undergraduate student Cheng Cheng received a Computer Science Award for Outstanding Research. Her research was published in ISAIM 2018. Congratulations to Cheng, Satish, and Hong!
• Ph.D. student Liron Cohen proposed his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Hong Xu defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Our group members got four papers accepted to the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI) despite an acceptance rate of only 20.64 percent. Congratulations everyone!
• Sven co-organized the International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (AAMAS) 2018 as conference co-chair. Thanks to all authors, the 22 area chairs, the 101 SPC members and the 427 PC members!
• Sven co-organized the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS) 2018 as program co-chair. Thanks to all authors and the 202 PC members!
• Monash University invited Sven for a six-week visit. Thanks to all collaborators there, especially from their optimization group!
• We received an Amazon Research Award (ARA). Thanks Amazon Robotics!
• The IDM-lab hosted graduate student Eli Boyarski (Ben-Gurion University, Israel) as research visitor. Thank you for visiting!

2017

• Ph.D. student Tansel Uras proposed his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Undergraduate student Zhi Wang received a Computer Science Award for Outstanding Research. His research was published in ICAPS 2018. He chose UC San Diego to pursue a Ph.D. degree. Congratulations to Zhi and Satish!
• Sven became a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Thanks AAAS!
• Sven received the Computer Science and Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Award from the IEEE Computer Society "for his commitment to engaging students through project-based learning and mentoring that cultivates a passion for artificial intelligence." Thanks IEEE!
• Sven was one of three AAAI-17 outstanding senior program committee members (out of 325 senior program committee members). Thanks AAAI!
• The IDM-lab hosted Prof. Ariel Felner (Ben-Gurion University, Israel: 1 semester), Prof. Carlos Hernandez (Andres Bello National University, Chile: 2.5 months), Prof. Michael Rovatsos (University of Edinburgh, UK: 2.5 weeks), and Dr. Masoumeh Mansouri (Orebro Universitet, Sweden: 2 weeks) as research visitors. Thank you for visiting!

2016

• Our paper "W. Hoenig, S. Kumar, L. Cohen, H. Ma, H. Xu, N. Ayanian and S. Koenig, Multi-Agent Path Finding with Kinematic Constraints, Proceedings of the International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS), 2016" received the Outstanding Paper Award in the Robotics Track of ICAPS. Congratulations to Wolfgang, Satish, Liron, Hang, Hong and Nora!
• Alumnus William Yeoh (now a professor) was selected by IEEE Intelligent Systems as one of the "AI's 10 to Watch" 2015 ("10 young stars in the field of AI," chosen every two years from researchers around the world). Congratulations!
• Ph.D. students Tansel Uras and Liron Cohen received Best Teaching Assistant Awards. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Hong Xu proposed his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Undergraduate student Nolan Miller received a Computer Science Award for Outstanding Research. Congratulations to Nolan and Satish!
• Sven was elected ACM SIGAI chair. Thanks ACM SIGAI members!
• Sven continued as a distinguished speaker for the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) for his second (and necessarily last) term. Thanks ACM!

2015

• Undergraduate student David Zhang received a Computer Science Award for Excellence in Research. His research was published in AAMAS 2016. Congratulations to David and Satish!
• Sven received the Dean's Award for Innovation in Teaching and Education. Thanks students and colleagues!
• Sven co-organized the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) 2015 as program co-chair, which received 1991 submissions - more than every previous AAAI conference. Thanks to all authors, the 48 activity chairs, the 89 SPC members and the 974 PC members!

2014

• Ph.D. student Xiaoming Zheng defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Ph.D. student Tansel Uras received the Best Research Assistant Award! Congratulations!
• Undergraduate student Sangmook Jung received a Computer Science Award for Excellence in Research. His research was published in ICAPS 2014. Congratulations to Sanmook and Satish!

2013

• Ph.D. student Xiaoxun Sun defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Sven became a fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI). Thanks AAAI!
• Sven was elected to the executive council of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI). Thanks AAAI members!
• Sven became a distinguished speaker for the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM). Thanks ACM!
• A USC student team coached by Sven and others placed highly among all North American teams at the world finals of the International Collegiate Programming Contest (directly behind CMU and tied with MIT and Stanford). Congratulations to all students on the team!
• The IDM-lab hosted Prof. Carlos Hernandez Ulloa (Andres Bello National University, Chile) as research visitor. Thank you for visiting!

2012

• Ph.D. student Alex Nash defended his dissertation successfully. Congratulations!
• Sven received the Director's Award for Collaborative Integration as program director at the National Science Foundation (NSF) for the second year in a row. Thanks NSF!
• The IDM-lab hosted Dr. Marcello Cirillo (Orebro University, Sweden) and graduate student Giuseppe Caggianese (University of Basilicata, Italy) as research visitors. Thank you for visiting!

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