Ricky Zhu

"My PhD life in Edinburgh will be my unforgettable memory"

My PhD is about automated the construction and evolution of a probabilistic knowledge graph for a running system using a stream of system logs. This project involves some difficult yet interesting challenges, such as extracting formal knowledge from unstructured text data, quantifying the uncertainty of the extracted knowledge, updating/revising the existing knowledge in the light of the new acquired one, and establishing a continuous process. Therefore, I explored and exploited all kinds of AI techniques, including symbolic/sub-symbolic reasoning and learning. I am fond of my research project because it is novel, challenging, and forcing me to be open-minded. 

 

Why AIAI?

Well, I joined AIAI because my principal supervisor, Prof. Alan Bundy is in AIAI, and AIAI automatically become my home institute. I got to know my supervisors and talked to them, after which I found the project attracted me and my supervisors could offer me the help I need. After 2 years of exploration, I found that doing research in AIAI has a great advantage: I found that my colleagues are of diverse research topics in Artificial Intelligence, including theorem proving, searching & planning, probabilistic modelling, knowledge representation & reasoning, machine learning algorithms and applications, autonomous agents, complex network, IoT & Blockchain, CV, NLP, etc. As a result, I can easily reach someone of the topic I want to consult with, and benefit from fruitful ideas.

 

Any advice for other PhD applicants?

I think the most important things to note have already been emphasised many times, just list several: talk to the potential supervisors before committing to identify suitable projects and supports, talk to as many as possible PhD students to form a broad understanding of how a PhD life can be, and match the research project with one's interest and passion to obtain sustainable motivation. My personal advice is to get ready physically and mentally for this Hero's Journey, where hardship and happiness will travel along with you.