Svetha Venkatesh is a Deakin Distinguished Professor and Co-Director of Applied Artificial Intelligence Institute (A2I2) at Deakin University. She was elected a Fellow of the International Association of Pattern Recognition in 2004 for contributions to formulation and extraction of semantics in multimedia data, a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering in 2006, and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2021 for ground-breaking research and contributions that have had clear impact. In 2017, Professor Venkatesh was appointed an Australian Laureate Fellow, the highest individual award the Australian Research Council can bestow.
Professor Venkatesh and her team have tackled a wide range of problems of social significance, including the critical areas of autism, security and aged care. The outcomes have impacted the community and evolved into publications, patents, tools and spin-off companies. This includes three full patents, one start-up company (icetana) and two significant products - TOBY Playpad, Virtual Observer.
Professor Venkatesh has tackled complex pattern recognition tasks by drawing inspiration and models from widely diverse disciplines, integrating them into rigorous computational models and innovative algorithms. Her main contributions have been in the development of theoretical frameworks and novel applications for analyzing large scale, multimedia data. This includes development of several Bayesian parametric and non-parametric models, solving fundamental problems in processing multiple channel, multi-modal temporal and spatial data.
PhD in Computer Science
University of Western Australia
MTech in Electrical Engineering
IIT, New Delhi, India
BTech in Electronics and Telecommunications
IIT, Roorkee, India
Scientific/Research Societies and Academies
Our methods are grounded in statistical machine learning and pattern recognition. In our research, we ask the following questions:
We use Bayesian mathematics to develop an astract framework for optimising design and manufacturing of products and processess.
We present a portable platform for pervasive delivery of early intervention therapy using multi-touch interfaces and principled ways to deliver stimuli of increasing complexity and adapt to a child’s performance.
We are embarking on questions that arise in examination of large, disparate and multimodal hospital data sets. Can we impact and inform the formation of dynamic health intervention and improved safety and care
We are interested in the problems that arise when we examine hundreds of cameras. This big data problem opens up many new questions.
Dec 2023: Sample efficient AI with applications in health and advanced manufacturing, Generative AI for Government Summit 2023, Canberra, Australia
Oct 2023: Sample efficient AI with applications in health care and advanced manufacturing, 3rd International Conference on AI-ML Systems, The Chancery Pavillion, Bengaluru, India
Sept 2023: Responsible AI, The Leaders in STEM Education Conference, The Gordon Technical School, Geelong
Jun 2023: Harnessing Generative AI for STEM Innovation , 2023 Quad Fellowship Summit, Melbourne Connect
May 2023: ChatGPT and generative AI, Parliamentary Friends of Science event, Australian Parliament House, Canberra
May 2023: AI as a Positive Disruptor, IWN (Intelligent Water Networks) Annual Members Conference, Deakin Downtown, Melbourne
Oct 2022: AI in clinical applications, Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences 2022 Annual Scientific Meeting, Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne
Dec 2021: Sample efficient AI with applications in health care and advanced manufacturing, International Conference on Data Mining (ICDM), Virtual Platform
Oct 2021: Artificial Intelligence: Future directions in technology and law, Australian Academy of Science and Australian Academy of Law Joint Symposium, Virtual
Sep 2021: Sample efficient AI with applications in health care and advanced manufacturing, International Conference on Biofabrication, Virtual
Sep 2021: Delivering efficiency with AI, Digital Enhanced Living Hub Mini-Symposium, Virtual via Zoom
Jun 2021: Will AI make us happier, The McWhirter Conference, Virtual via Zoom
Jun 2021: SMEs: what are the AI opportunities?, AI and Cyber for SME Growth Symposium, Melbourne Via Streamyard
Jun 2021: Delivering efficiencies in health care and manufacturing, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence Future Science Platform (MLAI FSP) CSIRO conference, Virtual via Zoom, Australia
Mar 2021: Future Trends in Artificial Intelligence, Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning, Information Technology Industry Forum, Virtual via Zoom, Australia
Oct 2020: Foundations of AI, Mathematical Foundations of AI - Vaibhav Summit, Virtual, India
Oct 2020: Delivering efficiencies in health care, Machine Learning in Medicine Webinar, Virtual via Zoom, Australia
Feb 2020: Delivering Efficiencies through Machine Learning and AI, The Harvard Business Women’s Retreat, Geelong, Australia
Dec 2019: Delivering Efficiencies in Health Care and Manufacturing through Machine Learning, Cloudera Government Forum, Canberra, Australia
Dec 2019: Bayesian Optimisation and Design of Experiments, 4th Modelling Complex Warfighting Symposium, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
Oct 2019: Delivering Efficiencies through Machine Learning and AI, 2019 eResearch Australasia Conference, Brisbane, Australia
Sep 2019: Delivering Efficiencies through Machine Learning and AI, Copenhagen Center for Healthcare Technology, Denmark
Jul 2019: AI in Health – Exploring the opportunities and challenges, Discussion at Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences roundtable on AI in Health, Melbourne, Australia
May 2019: Delivering Efficiencies through Machine Learning and AI, Defence AI Coordination Centre, Canberra, Australia
May 2019: Human-Machine Cooperative AI System, Pivot Summit -Deakin Costa Hall, Geelong, Australia
Oct 2018: Accelerating Experimental Design through “Artificial research assistant”, ignite+Deakin event in conjunction with the Victorian Chamber of Commerce, Geelong, Australia
Jul 2018: Delivering efficiencies in health care and manufacturing, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India
Apr 2018: Accelerating Experimental Design, Intelligent Polymer Research Institute, University of Wollongong, Australia
Mar 2018: Detecting Rare Events, Collaborative Deans’ Lecture, Melbourne School of Engineering, Melbourne, Australia
Mar 2018: CEDA panel event/discussion on innovation and translating Australia’s leading research, Melbourne, Australia
Feb 2018: Delivering Efficiencies in Health Care and Manufacturing, The 11th IAPR International Conference on Biometrics (ICB 2018), Gold Coast, Australia
Nov 2017: Delivering Efficiencies in Healthcare and Manufacturing, Digital Image Computing: Techniques and Applications (DICTA2017), Sydney, Australia
Nov 2017: Machine Learning for Alloy and Material design, Institute for Frontier Materials Annual Conference, Geelong, Australia
Nov 2017: Machine Learning, Pattern Recognition and HMR, at Research Australia University Roundtable, Melbourne, Australia
Nov 2017: Close Encounters with Machine Learning, Creative Innovation (CI2017), Melbourne, Australia
Oct 2017: Detecting rare events, International Federation of Psychiatric Epidemiology Congress (IFPE2017), Melbourne, Australia
Jul 2016: Machine Learning: Beyond Data, 18th Annual Conference of the International Society for Bipolar Disorders (ISBD), Amsterdam, Netherlands
Apr 2016: Keynote, 20th Pacific Asia Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining PAKDD, New Zealand
Oct 2015: Dennis Moore Distinguished Oration, Australian Computer Society, Perth, Australia
Oct 2015: Harrison Lecture for Innovation, Geelong Smart Network, Geelong, Australia
Oct 2014: Suicide risk detection using electronic medical records, Brain Sciences UNSW Symposium, Kensington, Australia