Resume

I have always been fascinated with the interactions between individuals, systems, and content in networks. With the rapid evolution of deep learning, hybrid AI, and KDD research I feel like we’re on the cusp of some truly remarkable solutions that can make a difference in how systems and people communicate, learn, and grow. I want to be a part of that revolution.

Experience

Veloxiti : July 2019 – Present

Veloxiti designs commercial solutions that augment or enhance human capabilities across dozens of industries, specializing in cognitive solutions development for enterprise customers who focus on humans as the critical component. As a Principal Engineer II my particular focus is on hybrid symbolic and connectionist approaches leveraging knowledge-based AI informed by deep learning models, respectively. To date this approach has been leveraged for automated analysis of gas lift oil wells in the petroleum industry and anomaly detection in the cybersecurity space. Ecosystems used are Java and Python, with Veloxiti’s proprietary KBAI system based on the OODA loop (similar to BDI), Weka for non-ANN approaches, and DL work mostly performed using TensorFlow.

Georgia Institute of Technology : Jan 2017 – July 2019

As a Research Scientist II my responsibilities included but were not limited to assisting in development of research and experimental software systems, technical leadership in the lab, assisting Research Assistants (graduate and undergraduate), assisting in development of proposals, and documenting research for internal and/or external consumption. In the Design & Intelligence Lab, I was responsible for the technical lab oversight as well as the lead researcher on the VERA project (funded by NSF Award #1636848). This project provided a conceptual modeling and simulation web application for multi-domain experimentation leveraging big data sources and model-to-simulation compilers. The stacks most used were Spring (Java) and Python. I also assisted the Entertainment Intelligence Lab working with NLP models for event-to-event story generation pipelines utilizing GPT-2 and BERT.

Phase2 Technology : Jan 2012 – Dec 2016

Phase2 is primarily a web consultancy with large clients and demanding architectures. As a Senior Developer, I took on Technical Lead and/or Architect roles for several projects including:

I was also the Concentration Lead for the Data Migration & Processing team.  Platforms primarily used are LAMP-based CMSs, Acquia and OpenShift hosting, Solr and Elasticsearch indexing, and custom integrations.

Cool Blue Interactive : Apr 2010 – Jan 2012

Senior Developer at a boutique online agency responsible for site buildout; technical direction; and evaluation of new tools, technologies and services.  Responsible for management and training of junior developers, as well as a technical resource for the sales team. Platforms used were CakePHP, LAMP-based CMSs, OpenLayers+OpenGeo, hosted primarily on Rackspace Cloud.

Octobang : Jan 2004 – Apr 2010

Independent contractor building custom AI, automation and web solutions primarily for powersports, automotive, and niche social networking clients.

Infosys Development Group : Jan 1996 – Jan 2004

Senior Consultant for enterprise backend system design and implementation for various clients:

  • BMC Software (Enterprise Data Propagation SBU)
  • Altra Energy Technologies (FERC GISB-compliant EDI solutions, acquired by Caminus, Sungard)
  • Zeh Graphic Systems (enterprise graphics processing solutions, acquired by Petris)

Technologies used were C/C++, Java, multiple Unix platforms, Linux, multiple RDBMS platforms, Windows.

Zeh Graphic Systems : July 1994 – Jan 1996

Cross platform developer working with 12 variants of Unix, Linux, Mac OS, and Windows responsible for port of CAD rendering engines from FORTRAN to C and Objective C.  CAD systems used were AutoCAD, Intergraph, and Bentley MicroStation.  Developed Windows printer drivers for Novajet, HP, and legacy CMYK electrostatic wide format plotters.  Languages used were C, C++, and Objective C.  Industries primarily served were mapping and oil/gas E&P.

Knowledge Based Systems : Aug 1991 – May 1993

Software QA tester for DOS-based IDEF software implementations.  Worked into active software development porting IDEF systems to Windows using Borland C++, building dongle copy protection solutions used by all KBSI software on multiple platforms, and writing documentation for software built.

Education

Georgia Institute of Technology : Atlanta, GA

Graduated 2018, MS in Computer Science, Machine Learning specialization.

Saint Edward’s University : Austin, TX

Graduated 2003, MBA in Finance.

Saint Edward’s University : Austin, TX

Graduated 2000, BBA in Finance.

Texas A&M University : College Station, TX

Coursework in Biochemistry & Genetics (2 years)
Coursework in Computer Science & Engineering (3 years)

Skills

Languages

Java, Python, Elixir, C, C++, standard web technologies (Javascript, HTML, XML, JSON, JSON-LD, CSS). Exposure to R.

Machine Learning

Keras, Scikit-learn, Python MDP Toolbox, BURLAP, NumPy, SciPy, OpenAI Gym. Acquiring PyTorch, Caffe, TensorFlow.

Data Science

Pandas, NumPy, SciPy. Exposure to Tableau.

Natural Language Processing / Understanding

NLTK, CoreNLP, CLiPS Pattern, WordNet, VerbNet, FrameNet. Exposure to spaCy, GPT-2, BERT.

DevOps

Some CI/CD automation experience. Solid experience with Ubuntu, CentOS, RHEL, other proprietary Unixes, macOS, Windows, Docker, AWS. Limited experience with Kubernetes, Azure, GCP.

Current Personal Projects

Exploring leveraging node-classifying GNNs to make web content extraction more performant and powerful than current scraping approaches.

Exploring spatiotemporal GNN approaches to forecasting global macroeconomic trends based on humanitarian event data reporting.

Knowledge base construction from unstructured content using unsupervised learning models and standard ontologies.

Talks + Presentations

Atlanta Code Camp 2021
Deep Learning with Elixir

Atlanta Elixir Meetup (Apr 2021)
AI in [H]EX: A quick survey

Atlanta Elixir Meetup (Feb 2020)
Getting Deep with Annex

Atlanta Elixir Meetup (Aug 2019)
Clex: Scaling Beyond the CPU

Atlanta Elixir UG (Feb 2017)
NLP with Elixir: Say whuuut?

All Things Open 2014
Open Data + Open Source = Open Goodness

CapitalCamp 2014
Open Data, Not Just a Buzzword

BADCamp 2013
Drupal + Socrata = Open Data for the Masses!

DrupalCamp Atlanta 2013
Drupal + Socrata = Open Data for the Masses!

DrupalCamp Atlanta 2012
Large Drupal Multisites (GTA Case Study)

Atlanta Drupal User’s Group 2011
OpenLayers for Drupal: The 10,000 Foot View

Publications

Bates, R. Don’t forget about associative memories. (2020, November 7). The Gradient. https://thegradient.pub/dont-forget-about-associative-memories/

An, S., Bates, R., Hammock, J., Rugaber, S., Weigel, E., & Goel, A. (2020, July). Scientific modeling using large scale knowledge. In International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (pp. 20-24). Springer, Cham.

An, S., Bates, R., Hammock J., Rugaber, S., Weigel, E., & Goel, A. (2019) Learning by doing:
 Supporting experimentation in inquiry-based modeling. Poster presented at the 41st Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Montreal, July 2019.

An, S., Bates, R., Hammock J., Rugaber, S., Weigel, E., & Goel, A. (2019) Cognitive Assistance for Inquiry‐based Modeling. Poster presented at the 7th Annual Conference on Advances in Cognitive Systems (ACS), Cambridge, Aug 2019.

Ballapuram, P., Cassion, C., Subramanian, A., An, S., Bates, R., Rugaber, S., … & Goel, A. Question Answering with Encyclopedia of Life: Accessing Large-Scale Biological Knowledge.

An, S., Bates, R., Hammock, J., Rugaber, S., & Goel, A. (2018, June). VERA: Popularizing Science Through AI. In International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Education (pp. 31-35). Springer, Cham.

Affiliations

IEEE-CS

ACM (SIGIR, SIGKDD)

Erlang Ecosystem Foundation, Machine Learning Working Group

FCC Amateur Radio License, Technician Class – KO4AZA

American Radio Relay League