Wednesday, February 18 2026, 2 - 5pm Memorial Hall Ballroom The Institute for Artificial Intelligence invites you to Innovation & Collaboration: 2026 IAI Research Grants Spotlight, featuring presentations from our 2026 seed grant awardees. This exciting event will showcase interdisciplinary AI research, collaborative discussions, and perspectives on accelerating innovation across domains. Please join us on Wednesday, February 18 at 2:00pm in the Memorial Hall Ballroom! Agenda: [1:45 PM] Doors open: Networking over refreshments. [2:00 PM - 2:10 PM] Welcome & Introduction: Alessandro Orso (Dean, College of Engineering); Prashant Doshi (Executive Director, IAI). [2:10 PM – 3:00 PM] Talks by 2026 IAI Seed Grand Teams (Round 1): Zhen Xiang (Computing), Jie Lu (Education), Tianming Liu (Computing): Developing Multi-Agent World Model for Training AI Systems and Clinical Personnel in Emergency Department.1 Chao Huang (Public Health), Rongjie Liu (Statistics), Tianming Liu (Computing): AI-Driven Multimodal Biomarker Discovery and Reasoning in Depression and Related Mental Health Disorders.3 Eugene Douglass (Pharmacy), Suchi Bhandarkar (Computing), Megan Corbett (Vet. Med.), Lillian Oliviera (Vet. Med.): Building Multimodal Foundations for AI-Pathology at UGA.3 Qianwen Li (Engineering), Geng Yuan (Computing): Edge-AI for Safe and Efficient Autonomous Vehicles.5 [3:00 PM – 3:40 PM] Breakouts: Convergence Theme Breakouts & Refreshments. [3:40 PM – 4:30 PM] Talks by 2026 IAI Seed Grand Teams (Round 2): Lefteris Anastasopoulos (Public Admin.), Ryan Powers (International Affairs), Akshat Lakhiwal (MIS): Responsible Causal AI: Reproducible Designs, Testable Mechanism.2 Hee Lee (Social Work), Khaled Rasheed (Computing), Jaewoo Lee (Computing), Yana Zavros (Medicine), Soobin Kim (Social Work): Interpretable Deep Learning Linking Adverse Childhood Experiences, Biology, and Cognition: Identifying Modifiable Supports.2,3 Guoming Li (Poultry Science), Tianming Liu (Computing), Lakshmish Ramaswamy (Computing), Ramviyas Parasuraman (Computing): Building the first million-level benchmark dataset and foundation models for cost-effective poultry management.4 Amol Nankar (Horticulture), Bhabesh Dutta (Plant Pathology), Luan Oliveira (Horticulture), Zhihang Song (Horticulture), Jin Lu (Computing), Ramviyas Parasuraman (Computing): AI-Assisted Breeding for Anthracnose Resistance in Pepper (Capsicum spp.).4 [4:30 PM] Kyle Johnsen (Associate Director for Research & Outreach, IAI): Accelerating AI research with High Performance Computing & OpenAI (Superscripts point to the Research Convergence Themes: 1 - AI for Education, 2 - Ethics of AI for Human Society, 3 - AI & Future of Health and Work, 4 - AI for 3F, 5 - AI for Cyber and Societal Security)
