Ronald J. Williams is professor 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 ...

Northeastern University Northeastern University (NU) is a private university, private research university with its main campus in Boston. Established in 1898, the university offers undergraduate and graduate programs on its main campus as well as satellite campuses in ...

, and one of the pioneers of

neural networks A neural network is a network or circuit of biological neurons, or, in a modern sense, an artificial neural network, composed of artificial neurons or nodes. Thus, a neural network is either a biological neural network, made up of biological ...

. He co-authored a paper on the

backpropagation In machine learning, backpropagation (backprop, BP) is a widely used algorithm for training feedforward neural network, feedforward artificial neural networks. Generalizations of backpropagation exist for other artificial neural networks (ANN ...

algorithm which triggered a boom in neural network research. He also made fundamental contributions to the fields of

recurrent neural networks A recurrent neural network (RNN) is a class of artificial neural networks where connections between nodes can create a cycle, allowing output from some nodes to affect subsequent input to the same nodes. This allows it to exhibit temporal dynamic ...

and

reinforcement learning Reinforcement learning (RL) is an area of machine learning concerned with how intelligent agents ought to take actions in an environment in order to maximize the notion of cumulative reward. Reinforcement learning is one of three basic machine ...

. Together with Wenxu Tong and

Mary Jo Ondrechen Mary Jo Ondrechen (born 1953) is an American chemist, educator, researcher, community leader and activist. She serves as Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and Principal Investigator

he developed Partial Order Optimum Likelihood (POOL), a machine learning method used in the prediction of active amino acids in protein structures. POOL is a maximum likelihood method with a monotonicity constraint and is a general predictor of properties that depend monotonically on the input features.W. Tong, Y. Wei, L.F. Murga, M.J. Ondrechen, and R.J. Williams (2009). Partial Order Optimum Likelihood (POOL): Maximum Likelihood Prediction of Active Site Residues Using 3D Structure and Sequence Properties. PLoS Computational Biology, 5(1): e1000266.

References

External links

Home page of Ronald J. Williams
{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Ronald J. American computer scientists Northeastern University faculty People from Boston Living people Year of birth missing (living people)