The year 2022 was filled with significant achievements and activities for IAI (Information Access and Interaction) research group at the University of Stavanger. From hosting conferences to welcoming new members and engaging in group activities, IAI made remarkable contributions to the field of information retrieval. Here are some of the highlights and accomplishments from IAI in 2022.
Conferences and Workshops
IAI research group hosted the 44th European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR’22)! It was not only the northernmost ECIR ever but also the first major IR conference in a hybrid format. ECIR’22 was a great success, both in the number of attendees (378 in total, of which 185 in person) and their level of satisfaction. The conference received positive feedback and high satisfaction levels from attendees. The report on the conference is now available online, as well as our Flickr photo album.
Additionally, Krisztian Balog and former IAI member Shuo Zhang, together with David Maxwell and Paul Thomas, have co-organized a workshop on Simulation for Information Retrieval at SIGIR’21. The summary of the workshop has been published in the December issue of the SIGIR Forum [PDF].
Defenses
Trond Linjordet successfully defended his Ph.D. thesis titled "A Critical Look at the Evaluation of Knowledge Graph Question Answering." The defense was held with esteemed opponents Stefano Mizzaro from the University of Udine, Italy, and Maria Maistro from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. The thesis and a Flickr photo album capturing the defense can be accessed for further exploration.
Group activities
IAI researchers engaged in various group activities to foster collaboration, strategic planning, and personal growth. The team spent several days in Sauda, focusing on research methodology, group strategy, and values. Amidst their work, they also took advantage of the beautiful surroundings and skiing opportunities to enjoy some leisure time.
Another group outing took place at Utstein Monastery Hotel in Mosterøy, where the researchers dedicated their time to reviving and planning further development of the IAI MovieBot, a conversational movie recommender system. Discussions, coding sessions, and group activities were held, enhancing the capabilities of MovieBot. The original IAI MovieBot is described in a CIKM'20 demo paper [PDF]. Photos from the outing can be found here.
IAI actively participated in the TREC 2022 Conversational Assistance Track, showcasing their expertise and contributions to the advancement of conversational information retrieval systems. This was already the second participation of IAI in TREC CAsT. The working paper is now available online.
New members
IAI welcomed two new Ph.D. students, Nolwenn Bernard and Weronika Łajewska, who are funded by the Norwegian Research Center for AI Innovation (NorwAI). Under the supervision of Krisztian Balog, both students will contribute to the Language and Personalization work package.
Visitors
Ivan Sekulić, a third-year Ph.D. student from the Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) in Lugano, Switzerland, joined IAI for a three-month research visit. Ivan's work focuses on conversational approaches to information retrieval, and his visit provided an opportunity for collaboration and knowledge sharing within the group.
Publication venues
IAI researchers achieved significant publication success in 2022:
- 3 papers accepted at International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval (SIGIR’21)
- 1 demo paper accepted at ACM Conference on Recommender Systems (RecSys ‘21)
- 1 reproducibility paper accepted at European Conference on Information Retrieval (ECIR’23)