An EconoTimes perspective

Michael Milford

Associate professor, Queensland University of Technology

Associate professor, Queensland University of Technology I am a leading robotics researcher conducting interdisciplinary research at the boundary between robotics, neuroscience and computer vision, and a multi-award winning educational entrepreneur. My research models the neural mechanisms in the brain underlying tasks like navigation and perception in order to develop new robotics and computer vision-related technologies, with a particular emphasis on challenging application domains where current techniques fail such as all-weather, anytime positioning for autonomous vehicles. I currently hold the position of Associate Professor at the Queensland University of Technology, as well as Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Chief Investigator on the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision. My research has attracted more than twenty-one million dollars in research and industry funding, both in the form of sole investigator fellowships and large team grants from the Australian Research Council, Queensland Government, Microsoft, Caterpillar Corporation and the Asian Office of Aerospace Research and Development. My papers have won (4) or been finalists (7) for 11 best paper awards including the 2012 Best Vision paper at ICRA2012. My citation h-index is 25, with 2362 citations as of February, 2017. I have given more than 50 invited presentations across twelve countries at top international conferences, universities (including Harvard, MIT, CMU, Boston Uni, Cambridge and Imperial College London) and corporations (including Google Deepmind and Microsoft). I was a finalist (top 3 nationwide) in the 2016 Australian Museum Eureka awards for Outstanding Early Career Researcher. As an educational entrepreneur, I have written and produced innovative textbooks for high school students for fifteen years, with more than 6000 physical sales and educational website and YouTube views in excess of 1.5 million. I am currently launching the company Math Thrills, an initiative combining mass market entertainment and STEM education. Math Thrills received pre-seed funding on Kickstarter ($2500) and seed funding ($50,000) from QUT Bluebox, further funding ($25,000) from the AMP Foundation and is in initial school trials. The initiative has led to awards including the 2015 Queensland Young Tall Poppy of the Year Award and a 2015 TedXQUT talk. I have dual citizenship between Australia and the United States, and have lived and worked in locations including Boston, USA and Edinburgh and London in the UK, collaborating with organizations including Harvard University, Boston University, Oxford University, MIT, Edinburgh University, Imperial College London, Caterpillar, the US Air Force and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.