My lifetime research goal is best captured by Professor Rich Sutton‘s description of achieving the “Prize“: “Understanding the principles of intelligence—what it is and how it works—well enough to create (or become) beings of greater intelligence.“
My approach to achieving the “Prize” is by studying the learning behaviours of autonomous decision-making agents in multi-agent systems. In the short term, I am interested in coming up with principled solutions to address the problems of scale, non-stationarity, effective communication, safety, and sample inefficiency in multi-agent learning systems. As a consequence, my area of work is at the intersection of Reinforcement Learning (RL) and Game Theory. Through my research, I aim to bridge the widening gap between the theoretical understanding and empirical advances of Multi-agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) and make multi-agent learning algorithms deployable in a variety of large-scale real-world problems. From an application perspective, I am particularly interested in research applications of RL and MARL in large language models (generative AI), AI safety, robotics, finance, health, environment, recommender systems, and autonomous driving. In general, many aspects of my research are motivated by the emerging field of Computational Sustainability. My research regularly borrows ideas from the “Alberta Plan for AI Research“.
I am an Assistant Professor in the School of Computer Science at Carleton University, Ottawa, where I hold a Canada Research Chair (Tier II) in Artificial Intelligence. Also, I am a Faculty Affiliate at the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence, Toronto, and the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society, Toronto.
Previously, I was a Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow at the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence, where I was supervised by Professor Pascal Poupart and Professor Sheila McIlraith. Before the postdoctoral appointment, I was a doctoral student in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at the University of Waterloo, advised by Professors Mark Crowley and Kate Larson. My doctoral dissertation won the Canadian AI Association‘s (CAIAC) Best Doctoral Dissertation Award in 2023. During my Ph.D., I was a part of the Vector Postgraduate Affiliate program.
As part of my research, I have collaborated with several companies, including Microsoft, Royal Bank of Canada (Borealis AI), Denso International America, Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI), and the Bank of Montreal. Additionally, I have consulted for various early-stage AI startups. My research has a significant applied focus, and I always welcome the oppourtunity to engage with the industry in a variety of AI/ML research problems.
I am highly passionate about increasing equity and diversity across all levels in institutions of higher learning. I am currently a mentor at the IBET PhD Project to help with this.
A formal biography of me can be obtained from my Carleton Profile.
Pro bono Office Hours for Canadian Firms
One of my career objectives is to improve AI Adoption in Canadian Businesses. Towards this, I reserve a few hours every week for pro bono office hours (at no charge) for Canadian companies, startups, and non-profits who require advice on problems pertaining to integrating AI/ML within their products/offerings.
If you are a Canadian organization (company, startup, non-profit, etc.) who would benefit from speaking to an AI researcher, email me a brief description of your requirements and the amount of time you would like to schedule for a meeting (usually 30 minutes – 1 hour). Do confirm that you have a presence in Canada (either incorporated in Canada or have at least one physical branch with active employees in Canada). Note that I am happy to help with any problem in AI/ML, but my expertise is in the topics of Reinforcement Learning, Multi-agent Systems, Generative AI, AI Safety, and Deep Learning.
If you are a Canadian small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) or startup, who would benefit from a longer term collaboration or assistance, consider joining the Vector Institute’s Fast Lane Program. I am actively advising companies through that program for a few hours every week on a pro bono basis.
Prospective Graduate Students
I will be accepting multiple students at the master’s and PhD level in the Master of Computer Science, the Master of Data Science, the PhD in Computer Science, and the PhD in Data Science and AI programs at Carleton for Fall 2026. Students will be expected to work on research problems that broadly overlap my research interests described above.
I require students to be knowledgeable (preferably through courses at the undergraduate level) in foundational mathematical topics relevant to my research (probability and statistics, calculus, linear algebra, and optimization). Further, I expect students to have strong skills in programming, writing, and communication. If you are interested in joining my research group, email me ([email protected]) your current CV, transcripts, and a research statement explaining what research problems interest you along with a brief description of your prior courses/experiences that have prepared you for conducting this research (1-2 pages). If relevant, I will also require evidence that you meet the English language requirements for a graduate program at Carleton. Also, make sure to clearly mention if you will be a domestic (Canadian PR/Canadian Citizen) or international student, and what program you intend to pursue (master’s/PhD).
Please note that I constantly receive many emails from students, and I am unable to reply to each email individually. Be rest assured that I read all emails from prospective students. However, I only reply to a select few students whose background and research interests match my requirements. I wish you the best in your search.
Prospective Undergraduate Honours Project (COMP 4905) and Honours Thesis (COMP 4906) Students
I am always excited about supervising undergraduate students in research areas that broadly overlap my interests. If you are an undergraduate student at Carleton interested in pursuing an Honours Project or an Honours Thesis under my supervision, email me a brief description of your problem of interest along with your CV and transcripts.
News
March 2026: I am giving an invited talk at Carleton University’s Data Day event on March 31. I encourage you all to register and attend the event in person. More details are available here.
March 2026: I am giving a (in-person) talk on AI in the Physical World at the Science Cafe in OPL on March 11. Details and registration forms can be found in this link.
December 2025: Grant awarded from Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy). Details can be found here.
November 2025: I will be teaching COMP 5801H/COMP 4900: Generative AI and Large Language Models at Carleton in Winter 2026. The public course webpage can be found here (enrolled students can also use Brightspace). A tentative course outline can be found here.
October 2025: I have been recognized as one of Carleton’s newest Canada Research Chairs.
October 2025: I am giving an invited talk at ServiceNow AI Research on some of my work in applying MARL to the real-world on October 21. If you are at ServiceNow, I hope to connect with you during the talk.
September 2025: I am giving a lightning talk at the Innovation Morning event at Carleton University, Kanata North Campus, on September 18. My talk will cover some of my recent work and its applications in governance. Please register, and I hope to see you there.
July 2025: I am excited to announce that I am starting at the School of Computer Science in Carleton University as an Assistant Professor and Canada Research Chair. I will continue at the Vector Institute as a Faculty Affiliate.
May 2025: I will be attending Canadian AI in Calgary this month. See you in Calgary, if you are attending as well.
Apr 2025: I will be attending ICLR in Singapore this month. See you in Singapore, if you are attending as well.
Mar 2025: Blog article on my research goals and progress over the last few years has been published by the Vector Institute. It can be found here. Comments and suggestions welcome!
Mar 2025: One paper accepted to AISTATS. This paper provides novel ways of improving cooperation through the process of voluntary commitment. The paper is available on arXiv. See you in Mai Khao, Thailand in May if you are attending AISTATS.
Feb 2025: I will be attending AAAI in Philadelphia this month. See you in AAAI, if you are attending as well.
Jan 2025: One paper accepted to TMLR. This paper provides a comprehensive survey of the emerging field of Inverse Constrained Reinforcement Learning.
Nov 2024: I joined the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society as a Postdoctoral Fellow (status only).
May 2024: One paper accepted to ICML. This paper provides a way of estimating confidence while learning constraints from expert datasets in the context of reinforcement learning. See you in Vienna, Austria if you are attending ICML in July. Full version of the paper can be found in arXiv.
February 2024: ChemGymRL is accepted to be published in Digital Discovery.
February 2024: Vector Institute has moved to the Schwartz Reisman Innovation Campus in downtown Toronto.
October 2023: ChemGymRL is accepted to be presented in NeurIPS-23 AI for Accelerated Materials Design Workshop and AI for Science Workshop. See you in New Orleans in December if you are attending NeurIPS.
August 2023: One paper accepted in TMLR. This paper explores the advantages of policy-gradient based learning by leveraging instructions/help from multiple teachers in the same environment.
May 2023: Presenting our JAIR paper on Multi-agent advising in IJCAI-2023 (journal track) in Macao, China. See you in Macao in August if you are attending IJCAI.
May 2023: My PhD Dissertation won the CAIAC best doctoral dissertation award. Here is the Twitter announcement. I am giving a talk in Canadian AI in Montreal on my doctoral dissertation on June 8th.
April 2023: Co-teaching CS486/CS 686: Introduction to AI at the University of Waterloo. Refer to the course website here.
January 2023: Two papers (one full paper and one extended abstract) accepted to AAMAS-2023. See you in London in June if you are attending AAMAS.
Sep 2022: I joined the Vector Institute as a Postdoctoral Fellow.