David T. Cliff (born 1966) is a

Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professor ...

in the Department of Computer Science at the

University of Bristol The University of Bristol is a Red brick university, red brick Russell Group research university in Bristol, England. It received its royal charter in 1909, although it can trace its roots to a Society of Merchant Venturers, Merchant Venturers' sc ...

and was formerly the Director of the UK Large-scale Complex IT Systems (LSCITS) Initiative. Cliff is the inventor of the seminal "ZIP"

trading algorithm Algorithmic trading is a method of executing orders using automated pre-programmed trading instructions accounting for variables such as time, price, and volume. This type of trading attempts to leverage the speed and computational resources of ...

, one of the first of the current generation of autonomous adaptive

algorithmic trading Algorithmic trading is a method of executing orders using automated pre-programmed trading instructions accounting for variables such as time, price, and volume. This type of trading attempts to leverage the speed and computational resources of ...

systems, which was demonstrated to outperform human traders in research published in 2001 by IBM.

Education

Cliff attended the state-funded Segsbury School (now known as King Alfred's Academy) in

Wantage Wantage () is a historic market town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in Oxfordshire, England. Although within the boundaries of the Historic counties of England, historic county of Berkshire, it has been administered as part of the V ...

. Cliff has a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

degree in Computer Science from the

University of Leeds , mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased , established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds , ...

, with

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast ...

and

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper ''Piled Higher and Deeper'' (also known as ''PhD Comics''), is a newsp ...

degrees in Cognitive Science from the

University of Sussex , mottoeng = Be Still and Know , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £14.4 million (2020) , budget = £319.6 million (2019–20) , chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar , vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil , ...

Career and research

Cliff spent the first seven years of his career working as an academic, initially at the

UK and then as an associate professor in the

MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) is a research institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) formed by the 2003 merger of the Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) and the Artificial Intelligence La ...

, Cambridge USA. Cliff's early research was in

computational neuroscience Computational neuroscience (also known as theoretical neuroscience or mathematical neuroscience) is a branch of neuroscience which employs mathematical models, computer simulations, theoretical analysis and abstractions of the brain to ...

neuroethology Neuroethology is the evolutionary and comparative approach to the study of animal behavior and its underlying mechanistic control by the nervous system. It is an interdisciplinary science that combines both neuroscience (study of the nervous syste ...

studying visual control of gaze and flight in airborne insects; in using

artificial evolution In computational intelligence (CI), an evolutionary algorithm (EA) is a subset of evolutionary computation, a generic population-based metaheuristic optimization algorithm. An EA uses mechanisms inspired by biological evolution, such as reproduct ...

to automate the design of autonomous mobile robots; and in studying the coadaptive dynamics of competitive co-evolutionary arms-races (e.g. between species of predator and prey). In 1996, while working as a consultant for

Hewlett Packard Labs Hewlett Packard Labs is the exploratory and advanced research group for Hewlett Packard Enterprise and its businesses. It was formed in November, 2015 when HP Labs spun off Hewlett Packard Labs to reflect the spin off of Hewlett Packard Enterpris ...

, Cliff invented the "ZIP" trading algorithm. In 1998 he resigned his post at MIT to take up a job as a senior research scientist at the HP Labs European Research Centre in Bristol, UK, where he founded and led HP's Complex Adaptive Systems research group. In early 2005, Cliff moved to

Deutsche Bank Deutsche Bank AG (), sometimes referred to simply as Deutsche, is a German multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Sto ...

's Foreign Exchange trading floor in London, where he worked as a director in Deutsche's FX Complex Risk Group. In late 2005, Cliff resigned from Deutsche to serve as a Professor of Computer Science at the

University of Southampton , mottoeng = The Heights Yield to Endeavour , type = Public research university , established = 1862 – Hartley Institution1902 – Hartley University College1913 – Southampton University Coll ...

. In October 2005 Cliff was appointed Director of a UK national research consortium, addressing issues in the science and engineering of Large-scale Complex IT Systems (LSCITS): this £14m ($28m) research project involved approximately 250 person-years of effort over the years 2007-2014. In July 2007, Cliff moved to become Professor of Computer Science at the

. The

LSCITS The UK Large-Scale Complex IT Systems (LSCITS) Initiative is a research and graduate education programme focusing on the problems of developing large-scale, complex IT systems (also referred to as Ultra-large-scale systems or ULSS). The initiati ...

Initiative shared much with the research effort in the USA directed at

Ultra-Large-Scale Systems Ultra-large-scale system (ULSS) is a term used in fields including Computer Science, Software Engineering and Systems Engineering to refer to software intensive systems with unprecedented amounts of hardware, lines of source code, numbers of user ...

(ULSS). In 2011, Cliff and Linda Northrop (Director of the USA's

Software Engineering Institute The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) is an American research and development center headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Its activities cover cybersecurity, software assurance, software engineering and acquisition, and component capab ...

's ULSS Project) jointly authored a paper on the global financial markets as ultra-large-scale systems, commissioned by the UK

Government Office for Science The Government Office for Science is an science advisory group that is part of the British government. The organisation advises the UK Government on policy and decision-making based on science and long-term thinking. It is led by the Government C ...

. From 2010-2012 Cliff was a member of the 8-person core Lead Expert Group (LEG) which led the UK Government's

two-year investigation into ''The Future of Computer Trading in Financial Markets''. In addition to Cliff, the other members of the LEG were Philip Bond,

Clara Furse Dame Clara Hedwig Frances Furse DBE () (born 16 September 1957) was the Chief Executive of the London Stock Exchange between January 2001 and May 2009, and was the first woman to occupy the position. In 2005, she was ranked 19th in ''Fortune'' ...

, Charles Goodhart,

Andy Haldane Andrew G. Haldane, (; born 18 August 1967) is a British economist who worked at the Bank of England between 1989 and 2021 as the chief economist and executive director of monetary analysis and statistics. He resigned from the Bank of England ...

, Kevin Houstoun, Oliver Linton, and Jean-Pierre Zigrand, co-Director of the Systemic Risk Centre. The investigation commissioned large volumes of peer-reviewed research from international experts, all of which was published by the

and which is summarised in the project's extensive final report. Cliff is a regular presenter on the stage-show GCSE Science Livehttp://gcsesciencelive.net/ GCSE Science Live where large audiences (typically more than 1,000) of schoolchildren in years 10-11 watch presentations from well-known scientists. Other scientists involved in GCSE Science Live shows include

Maggie Aderin-Pocock Margaret Ebunoluwa Aderin-Pocock (; born 9 March 1968) is a British space scientist and science educator. She is an honorary research associate of University College London's Department of Physics and Astronomy. Since February 2014, she has co ...

Jim Al-Khalili Jameel Sadik "Jim" Al-Khalili ( ar, جميل صادق الخليلي; born 20 September 1962) is an Iraqi-British theoretical physicist, author and broadcaster. He is professor of theoretical physics and chair in the public engagement in scien ...

Richard Dawkins Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An at ...

Ben Goldacre Ben Michael Goldacre (born 20 May 1974) is a British physician, academic and science writer. He is the first Bennett Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine and director of the Bennett Institute for Applied Data Science at the University of Oxford ...

, Steve Jones, Sir David King,

Simon Singh Simon Lehna Singh, (born 19 September 1964) is a British popular science author, theoretical and particle physicist. His written works include ''Fermat's Last Theorem'' (in the United States titled ''Fermat's Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve th ...

and Lord Winston. In December 2013 Cliff presented a one-off TV documentary on

BBC Four BBC Four is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was launched on 2 March 2002

titled ''The Joy of Logic''. The programme explored the human quest for certainty and sound reasoning, and the development of logical machines and computers. In April 2015 ''The Joy of Logic'' won the top prize - Best International Film - at Europe's leading Science Film Festival, Academia Film Olomouc. It had previously been nominated for international documentary film/TV awards including a "Rockie" at the

Banff World Media Festival The Banff World Media Festival (formerly known as the Banff World Television Festival) is an international media event held in the Canadian Rockies The Canadian Rockies (french: Rocheuses canadiennes) or Canadian Rocky Mountains, comprising b ...

and a

Grierson Award The Grierson Awards are awards set up by The Grierson Trust to recognise innovative and exciting documentary films, created to commemorate the life and work of the pioneering Scottish documentary filmmaker John Grierson. The inaugural Awards w ...

in the UK (losing to ''

Educating Yorkshire ''Educating Yorkshire'' is the second series of the British documentary television programme '' Educating'' broadcast on Channel 4. The eight-episode first series was first broadcast on 5 September 2013. Its format is based on the BAFTA Award-wi ...

'').

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cliff, Dave 1966 births Academics of the University of Bristol Academics of the University of Sussex Alumni of the University of Leeds Alumni of the University of Sussex English computer scientists Fellows of the British Computer Society Living people Researchers of artificial life