Daphne Koller ( he, דפנה קולר; born August 27, 1968) is an

Israeli-American , native_name_lang = , image = , caption = , population = 110,000–150,000 , popplace = New York metropolitan area, Los Angeles metropolitan area, Miami metropolitan area, and other large metropolitan ar ...

computer scientist. She was a professor in the department of

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

and a

MacArthur Foundation The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private foundation that makes grants and impact investments to support non-profit organizations in approximately 50 countries around the world. It has an endowment of $7.0 billion and p ...

fellowship recipient. She is one of the founders of

Coursera Coursera Inc. () is a U.S.-based massive open online course provider founded in 2012 by Stanford University computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller. Coursera works with universities and other organizations to offer online courses, ...

, an online education platform. Her general research area is

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech re ...

and its applications in the

biomedical sciences Biomedical sciences are a set of sciences applying portions of natural science or formal science, or both, to develop knowledge, interventions, or technology that are of use in healthcare or public health. Such disciplines as medical microbio ...

. Koller was featured in a 2004 article by ''

MIT Technology Review ''MIT Technology Review'' is a bimonthly magazine wholly owned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and editorially independent of the university. It was founded in 1899 as ''The Technology Review'', and was re-launched without "The" in ...

'' titled "10 Emerging Technologies That Will Change Your World" concerning the topic of Bayesian machine learning.

Education

Koller received a bachelor's degree from the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...

in 1985, at the age of 17, and a master's degree from the same institution in 1986, at the age of 18. She completed her PhD at Stanford in 1993 under the supervision of

Joseph Halpern Joseph Yehuda Halpern (born 1953) is an Israeli-American professor of computer science at Cornell University. Most of his research is on reasoning about knowledge and uncertainty. Biography Halpern graduated in 1975 from University of Toronto wi ...

Career and research

After her PhD, Koller did

postdoctoral research A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

from 1993 to 1995 under

Stuart J. Russell Stuart Jonathan Russell (born 1962) is a British computer scientist known for his contributions to artificial intelligence (AI). He is a professor of computer science at the University of California, Berkeley and was from 2008 to 2011 an adjunct ...

, and joined the faculty of the Stanford University computer science department in 1995. She was named a

MacArthur Fellow The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to between 20 and 30 indi ...

in 2004. She was elected a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy ...

in 2011 for contributions to representation, inference, and learning in probabilistic models with applications to robotics, vision, and biology. She was also elected a fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

in 2014. In April 2008, Koller was awarded the first ever $150,000 ACM-

Infosys Infosys Limited is an Indian multinational information technology company that provides business consulting, information technology and outsourcing services. The company was founded in Pune and is headquartered in Bangalore. Infosys is the s ...

Foundation Award in Computing Sciences. She and

Andrew Ng Andrew Yan-Tak Ng (; born 1976) is a British-born American computer scientist and technology entrepreneur focusing on machine learning and AI. Ng was a co-founder and head of Google Brain and was the former Chief Scientist at Baidu, building ...

, a fellow Stanford computer science professor in the AI lab, founded

in 2012. She served as the co-CEO with Ng, and then as president of Coursera. She was recognized for her contributions to online education by being named one of ''Newsweek''s 10 Most Important People in 2010, ''Time'' magazine's 100 Most Influential People in 2012, and ''Fast Company''s Most Creative People in 2014. She left Coursera in 2016 to become chief computing officer at

Calico Calico (; in British usage since 1505) is a heavy plain-woven textile made from unbleached, and often not fully processed, cotton. It may also contain unseparated husk parts. The fabric is far coarser than muslin, but less coarse and thick than ...

. In 2018, she left Calico to start and lead Insitro, a drug discovery startup. Koller is primarily interested in representation, inference, learning, and decision making, with a focus on applications to

computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the hum ...

and

computational biology Computational biology refers to the use of data analysis, mathematical modeling and computational simulations to understand biological systems and relationships. An intersection of computer science, biology, and big data, the field also has fo ...

. Along with Suchi Saria and Anna Penn of Stanford University, Koller developed PhysiScore, which uses various data elements to predict whether premature babies are likely to have health issues. In 2009, she published a textbook on probabilistic graphical models together with

Nir Friedman Nir Friedman (born 1967) is an Israeli Professor of Computer Science and Biology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His research combines Machine Learning and Statistical Learning with Systems Biology, specifically in the fields of Gene Regul ...

. She offered a free online course on the subject starting in February 2012. Her former doctoral students include Lise Getoor,

Mehran Sahami Mehran Sahami is an Iranian-born American computer scientist, engineer, and professor. He is the James and Ellenor Chesebrough Professor in the School of Engineering, and Professor (Teaching) and Associate Chair for Education in the Computer Scien ...

, Suchi Saria,

Eran Segal Eran Segal ( he, ערן סגל; born 15 November 1973) is a computational biologist professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science. He works on developing quantitative models for all levels of gene regulation, including transcription, chromatin, a ...

, and

Ben Taskar Ben Taskar (March 3, 1977 – November 18, 2013) was a professor and researcher in the area of machine learning and applications to computational linguistics and computer vision. He was a Magerman Term Associate Professor for Computer and Info ...

. Koller was interviewed by

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Professor Jim Al-Khalili , in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of one living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili a ...

broadcast on 27 September 2022.

Honors and awards

Her honors and awards include: * 1994: Arthur Samuel Thesis Award * 1996:

Sloan Foundation The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is an American philanthropic nonprofit organization. It was established in 1934 by Alfred P. Sloan Jr., then-president and chief executive officer of General Motors. The Sloan Foundation makes grants to support o ...

Faculty Fellowship * 1998:

Office of Naval Research The Office of Naval Research (ONR) is an organization within the United States Department of the Navy responsible for the science and technology programs of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps. Established by Congress in 1946, its mission is to plan ...

Young Investigator Award * 1999:

Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers The Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) is the highest honor bestowed by the United States government on outstanding scientists and engineers in the early stages of their independent research careers. The White ...

(PECASE) * 2001:

IJCAI Computers and Thought Award The IJCAI Computers and Thought Award is presented every two years by the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence (IJCAI), recognizing outstanding young scientists in artificial intelligence. It was originally funded with royal ...

* 2003: Cox Medal at Stanford * 2004:

* 2004: Oswald G. Villard Fellow for Undergraduate Teaching at Stanford University * 2007: ACM Prize in Computing * 2008: ACM/

Award * 2010: ''Newsweek''s 10 Most Important People * 2010: ''Huffington Post'' 100 Game Changers * 2011: Elected to

* 2013: ''Time'' magazine's 100 Most Influential People * 2014: Elected fellow of the

* 2014: ''Fast Company''s Most Creative People in Business * 2017: Elected

ISCB Fellow ISCB Fellowship is an award granted to scientists that the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) judges to have made “outstanding contributions to the fields of computational biology and bioinformatics”. , there are 76 Fellow ...

by the

International Society for Computational Biology The International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) is a scholarly society for researchers in computational biology and bioinformatics. The society was founded in 1997 to provide a stable financial home for the Intelligent Systems for Mole ...

(ISCB) * 2019:

ACM-AAAI Allen Newell Award The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) is an international scientific society devoted to promote research in, and responsible use of, artificial intelligence. AAAI also aims to increase public understanding of artif ...

for contributions with significant breadth across computing, or that bridge computer science and other disciplines

Books

Koller's book authorships include: * Koller contributed one chapter to the 2018 book ''Architects of Intelligence: The Truth About AI from the People Building it'' by the American futurist Martin Ford. * ''Probabilistic Graphical Models: Principles and Techniques'' by Daphne Koller and

Personal life

Koller is married to Dan Avida, a venture capitalist at Opus Capital.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Koller, Daphne 1968 births Living people MacArthur Fellows Artificial intelligence researchers Stanford University alumni American roboticists Women roboticists Fellows of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence Stanford University School of Engineering faculty American women computer scientists Women statisticians 20th-century American Jews Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering American bioinformaticians Fellows of the International Society for Computational Biology Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Recipients of the ACM Prize in Computing Israeli Jews 21st-century American Jews 20th-century American women 21st-century American women