Anyscale Learning For All

Machine learning technology, evolutionary algorithms, and data science for knowledge mining, prediction, analytics, and optimization with projects in cyber security, software analysis, MOOC technology, and medical technology.

 

Research Themes

Artificial Adversarial Intelligence

Understanding Programs & Programming

Data Analytics
Artificial Adversarial Intelligence Understanding Programs and Programming Data Analytics

 

Applications: Adversarial dynamics modeling of networks, adversarial examples in malware and software, adversarial hardening, malware detection and classification, automatic program analysis for vulnerabilities, security by deception, security by segmentation, and peer to peer network defenses against DDOS, lateral stage and scanning attacks; MOOCs on computational thinking and programming, MOOC clickstream and activity data analysis with deep learning; medical experimental analytics, COVID-19 agent-based modeling.

 

 

Featured ALFA News!

Multi-term RA-funded Positions with the ALFA Group at CSAIL

ALFA has multiple vacancies for EECS MEng students with an interest in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. The positions are all research in intelligent adversarial dynamics. They include:

  • Rational Adversarial AI for Cyber Security: developing an interactive, human-in-the-loop, network environment proxy that acts as an attack facilitator and Blue team role
  • Left of the Boom: planning Red-team cyber attacks (APT scenarios)
  • CICADA: machine learning Red team combat strategies vs a Blue team in a game simulation 

​Priority will be given to students free to start in IAP 2021
Contact alfa-apply (@) csail.mit.edu to apply
Include:  project of interest by name, relevant courses and grades, relevant experience, expected year of graduation, and CV. 

 

 

Diversity Drives Innovation and Learning

At the Anyscale Learning For All (ALFA) Group, we mean Anyscale Learning for ALL. ALFA is dedicated to cultivating an inclusive culture that supports, promotes, and empowers diverse voices in Computer Science & AI. Our focus is to improve and build machine learning, AI, and data analytics technology that works for everyone.

Representation matters.

We want our research to be representative of everyone who benefits and learns from it. We value people with different experiences, perspectives, and backgrounds - it’s the cornerstone of our approach to learning and research. We celebrate diversity along many axes: race, religion, ethnicity, age, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, genetic disposition, neurodiversity, disability, veteran status and any other aspect which makes you unique.

 

 

ALFA's research would not be possible without the past and ongoing support of our industry sponsors
ALFA sponsors past and present
The views, opinions and positions expressed by ALFA Group and on this site are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions or positions of their sponsors
 
 
 
ALFA Group is formerly the Evolutionary Design and Optimization (Evo-DesignOpt) Group
 
 

 

Recent News

2021

January

Getting Adversarial AI to Secure Us From Hackers
Una-May O'Reilly
India Science Festival, 2021
 

We bid farewell to Postdoc Associate, Chathika Gunaratne. Chathika is off on a new adventure and has taken a positon at Oakridge National Lab. 
 

ALFA says goodbye to PhD Candidate, Bryn Reinstadler. Bryn will be taking up a position at Novartis. 

 

 

 

 

2020

December

ALFA bids farewell to Postdoc Associate, Jamal Toutouh. We wish him the  best of luck on his new adventure. 
 

Natural and Artificial Intelligence
Una-May O'Reilly
IEEE SSCI 2020: Virtual Symposium Series on Computational Intelligence
 

 

November

Scalable Machine Learning, Evolutionary Algorithms, and Frameworks
Erik Hemberg for Una-May O'Reilly
AAAI Fall Symposium Series: The 2nd Workshop on Deep Models and Artificial Intelligence for Defense Applications: Potentials, Theories, Practices, Tools and Risks 
 

 

October

Adversarial Artificial Intelligence
Una-May O'Reilly
Keynote Speaker, 8th National Seminar of Applied Computational Intelligence in Mexico

 

September

The Importance of Diversity in AI and Healthcare Panel
Una-May O'Reilly
STEMM MIT CSAIL AI in Healthcare Summit
 

Introduction to Applied Machine Learning Community of Research
Protecting Malware Detectors from Attack
Una-May O'Reilly
CSAIL Alliances Annual Meeting
 

 

MITx Harvard Women in AI Interview Series
Una-May O'Reilly

Interviewed by Jackie Valeri, MIT Ph.D. Candidate
 

 

ALFA welcomes new MEng students Sanja Simonovikj, Diana Flores, Urmi Mustafi, all of which were previously UROPs with ALFA; new SDM student Byeong Jo Kong, and returning SDM student Afra Ansaria; new SuperUROPs Alexandra Dima, Sabrina Tseng, and Tamara Mitrovska; returning UROPs Rene Silva, Kate Xu, and Ashwin Srinivasan. Robert Gold returns as a research intern.
 

ALFA welcomes a new Postdoc Associate, Chathika Gunaratne. Previously, we hosted Chathika as a visitor, he was also a collaborator on one of our projects over the summer.
 

We bid farewell to visiting students: Jaeyoon Kim, University of Korea, Seoul Korea; Hannah Burd,  Dartmough College; Jake Springer, Swarthmore College, and Shasha Shahkov, Williams College.
 

 

August

Artificial Adversarial Intelligence
Una-May O'Reilly
Keynote Speaker, Machine Learning Workshop ACM SIGKDD Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining 2020

 

July

Artificial Intelligence and Malware Detection
Una-May O'Reilly
MIT Horizon - Expert Sessions
 

The Dynamics of Intelligent Cyber Adversaries
Una-May O'Reilly
Plenary Speaker, New England Complex Systems Institute International Conference on Complex Systems (NECSI-ICCS) 2020
 

Women in AI - Interview Series
Una-May O'Reilly
MIT Women in Machine Learning Group
 

Darktrace In Conversations With
Una-May O'Reilly
Dartrace Digital Event Series
 

The Neural Basis of Comprehending Programs
Shashank Srikant
Brown University Reading Group
 

We bid farewell to Dirk Schweim, visiting PhD student from the Computer Science Department on Information Systems, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz Germany
 

 

June

We welcome summer UROPs: Tamara Mitrovska, Rene Reyes, Kate Xu and Boom Tiankanon. Michal Shlapentokh-Rothman returns as a post-graduate researcher for a partial summer term. We welcome visitors: Shasha Shashkov Williams College undergrad, Jake Springer Swarthmore College undergrad. We welcome back Hannah Burd, as a visiting undergrad student from Dartmouth College and Robert Gold as a research intern.
 

 

May

The Promise of AI: Cyber, Healthcare, and the New World
Una-May O'Reilly
Wired-Dartrace Panel Discussion, Cybersecurity Livestream
Related article "AI Will Be A Crucial Tool in the Fight Against Next-Generation Security Threats"

 

Chathika Gunaratne joins ALFA on a Quest for Intelligence project entitled Reopening COVID Risk Forecasting System

 

Jamal Toutouh "Algorithms Inspired by Nature & Deep Learning" Communidad ECUSA, 2019

#Evisibility-TV goes to MIT! Dr. Jamal Toutouh welcome us to chat about Artifical Intelligence and neuronal networks. Jamal explained how mathematical methods inspired by nature can help us solving day-to-day problems. Jamal dared to dream and believe in himself and now is working on what passionate him the most.

 

 

April

Check out the new Summer UROP and Fall SuperUROP projects!
 

Una-May O'Reilly "The Status of Artificial Intelligence" ZDNet, April 2020

Tonya Hall speaks with Dr. Una-May O'Reilly to learn more about the current status of artificial adversarial intelligence and the strengths of adversarial dynamics over model-based malware detectors.

 

 

February

We welcome Chathika Gunaratne, visiting postdoc from Complex Adaptive Systems Lab, University of Florida, Orlando Florida USA
 

ALFA welcomes back students for the Spring 2020 semester
 

We welcome Dirk Schweim, visiting PhD student from the Computer Science Department on Information Systems, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz Germany