AI Foundations: Ethics and Implementation

Arie van Deursen serves as Professor of Software Engineering at TU Delft, where he heads both the Software Engineering Research Group and the Department of Software Technology while directing the AI for Fintech Research lab, a five-year collaboration between ING and TU Delft. After earning his MSc in Computer Science from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and PhD from the University of Amsterdam, he conducted research at CWI before joining TU Delft as a professor in software engineering. His research spans software engineering, software testing, trustworthy AI, and human aspects of software engineering, with particular focus on empirical research conducted in close collaboration with industry. As scientific director of AI-for-Fintech Research, he leads initiatives involving 10 PhD students and numerous faculty members, while serving on the advisory board of ICAI and co-leading its Long Term Program on Trustworthy AI. His entrepreneurial spirit is evidenced by co-founding two successful companies: The Software Improvement Group (2000) and PerfectXL (2010). Recently elected as a Fellow of the Netherlands Academy of Engineering in 2023, he has supervised over 35 PhD students and 75 MSc students while serving as program co-chair for prestigious conferences like ICSE 2021 and ESEC/FSE 2017. Through his roles as member of the Advisory Council of IT Assessment for the Dutch government and the advisory council of ING Bank Netherlands, he continues to bridge academic innovation with practical applications in software engineering and artificial intelligence.

Marcel Worring serves as Professor of Data Science for Business Analytics at the Amsterdam Business School and Director of the University of Amsterdam's Informatics Institute, a 200-strong center focused on AI systems and networks. His most significant contribution has been co-founding the Innovation Center for AI (ICAI) in April 2018, a national initiative that facilitates collaboration between academia, industry, and government. As Scientific Director of the National Police Lab AI, a collaboration between Dutch Police, Utrecht University, and the University of Amsterdam, he leads the development of state-of-the-art AI techniques to improve public safety. His 15-year partnership with law enforcement has resulted in significant advances in multimedia analytics for criminal investigations, including tools for analyzing large multimedia collections, creating automatic data summaries, and identifying suspicious patterns. At the University of Amsterdam, he leads the MultiX research group, focusing on multimedia analytics and AI techniques for extracting rich information from complex data sets. His work spans multiple domains, including the development of AI-driven tools for child abuse investigations, suspect identification, and evidence verification, all while maintaining a strong emphasis on socially, legally, and ethically responsible implementation of AI technologies.

Frank van Harmelen serves as Professor of Knowledge Representation & Reasoning at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, where he leads the Knowledge Representation and Reasoning Group. His journey began with studies in mathematics and computer science in Amsterdam, followed by a PhD in Artificial Intelligence from Edinburgh University focusing on meta-level reasoning. Since joining VU Amsterdam in 1995, he has made landmark contributions to AI, including co-designing OWL, the knowledge representation language now used by major companies like Google, BBC, Amazon, and Uber. As one of the founders of the Semantic Web, he has helped make web data machine-interpretable through formal representations. He currently serves as principal investigator of the Hybrid Intelligence Centre, a €20 million collaboration between six Dutch universities focusing on AI systems that collaborate with humans rather than replace them. His academic excellence is recognized through fellowships in the European AI Society, membership in the Dutch Royal Academy of Sciences (KNAW), the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities, and the Academia Europaea. He also holds positions as adjunct professor at Wuhan University and Wuhan University of Science and Technology in China. His work has significantly influenced both academic research and practical applications in knowledge representation and AI systems.

Maarten de Rijke serves as Distinguished University Professor of Artificial Intelligence and Information Retrieval at the University of Amsterdam and Director of the Innovation Center for Artificial Intelligence (ICAI). His academic journey includes MSc degrees in Philosophy and Mathematics (both cum laude) from the University of Amsterdam and a PhD in Theoretical Computer Science. His research focuses on developing trustworthy technology to connect people to information, particularly in search engines, recommender systems, and conversational assistants. As founding director of ICAI since 2018, he leads a national network of AI labs connecting academia, industry, and government. His contributions have earned him numerous accolades, including membership in the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), the Tony Kent Strix Award, and the Keith van Rijsbergen Award. He has supervised nearly 100 PhD students and published over 1,100 papers. Beyond academia, he has helped generate over 200 million euros in project funding and served as VP of Personalization and Relevance at Ahold Delhaize. His work spans multiple research areas, including information retrieval, artificial intelligence, and human-centered computing, with particular emphasis on developing self-learning search engines and recommender systems that can adapt to user behavior.

Luís Cruz has established himself as a leading authority in sustainable software engineering and Green AI at Delft University of Technology, where he serves as an Assistant Professor and Scientific Manager of the AI-for-Fintech Research lab in collaboration with ING. After earning his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Porto, he has dedicated his career to advancing sustainable software practices and Green AI initiatives. His research portfolio includes groundbreaking work in energy-efficient mobile applications, software design patterns, and automated refactoring tools. As a prominent educator, he coordinates the CS MSc program's Data Science track at TU Delft and teaches courses in Sustainable Software Engineering and Release Engineering for Machine Learning Applications. His impact extends beyond academia through his role as Program Chair at CAIN 2024 and organizer of the CECAM-Lorentz Center seminar on "Greening AI with Software Engineering." Cruz's expertise in sustainable technology has garnered significant recognition, including the Best Paper Award at CAIN'23 and the Most Influential Paper Award at MOBILESoft'23. He actively contributes to the field through his extensive publication record and by helping organizations develop sustainable software engineering practices, making him a pivotal figure in the movement toward environmentally conscious software development.