People

Director

Stephen G. Ware, Ph.D.

Prof. Ware oversees the Narrative Intelligence Lab and all its projects. He develops artificial intelligence techniques for telling intelligent, adaptive, interactive stories in virtual environments like video games, training simulations, and tutoring systems. His interests include computational models of narrative, automated planning, computational cognitive science, and narrative theory.

He earned his B.S. with majors in Computer Science and Philosophy from Loyola University New Orleans and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science from North Carolina State University.

Stephen G. Ware's Publications

Stephen G. Ware's Website

Current Members

Cory Siler

Cory earned her B.S. and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky. She is currently working on question-answering as a method of story generation for interactive environments.

Cory Siler's Publications

Mira Fisher

Mira earned her B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky. She is currently working on regression-based heuristic search techniques for narrative planning.

Mira Fisher's Publications

Lasantha Senanayake

Lasa earned his B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. He is currently working on the Camelot interactive narrative sandbox environment.

Lasa's Publications

Lasa's Website

Gage Birchmeier

Gage earned their B.S. degrees in Computer Science from the University of Michigan. They are is currently working on a comparison of state-space narrative planning algorithms.

Alex's Publications

Partners

Brent Harrison, Ph.D.

Prof. Harrison oversees the CORGI Lab at the University of Kentucky and has partnered on several NIL projects that require machine learning expertise. His interests include deep learning, reinforcement learning, and explainable machine learning. His research focuses on creating artificial agents to effectively communicate and co-exist with humans and society at large.

He earned his B.S. in Computer Science from Auburn University and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science from North Carolina State University.

Brent Harrison's Publications at the Narrative Intelligence Lab

Brent Harrison's Website

Lewis J. Baker, Ph.D.

Dr. Baker assists with the design and analysis of NIL's various human subjects evaluations. His interests include perception, attention, data science, and explainable machine learning.

He earned his B.S. with majors in Psychological Sciences and Religious Studies at Loyola University New Orleans. He earned a doctoral certificate in Quantitative Methods and Evaluation and a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Vanderbilt University. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Rutgers Institute for Data Science, Learning & Applications. Currently, he is Director of Data Science at pymetrics, inc.

Lewis J. Baker's Publications at the Narrative Intelligence Lab

Past Members

Rachelyn Farrell

Rachel earned her B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Mississippi, her M.S. in Computer Science from the University of New Orleans, and her Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky. Her research spanned computational models of narrative salience, planning with character beliefs, visualization of large interactive story spaces, and integration of Large Language Models into narrative planning.

Rachel Farrell's Publications

Rachel Farrell's Website

Michael Probst

Michael earned his B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky. He worked on a serious game for helping patients recover from cognitive impairments brought on by long sedation.

Alireza Shirvani

Alex earned his M.S. in Computer Engineering from the University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran, and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Kentucky. He was the primary architect behind the Camelot Interactive Narrative sandbox environment. His dissertation expanded the types and quality of stories that an strong-story narrative planner can generate by modeling the personalities and emotions of agents.

Alex Shirvani's Publications

Active: Fall 2017 to Fall 2021 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans and University of Kentucky

E. T. Garcia

Edward earned his B.S. and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of New Orleans. His interests include game development and artificial intelligence. He developed methods for automatic experience management in Camelot and in a virtual reality Police Use of Force training simulation.

E. T. Garcia's Publications

Active: Fall 2015 to Fall 2018 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans

Jason Hall

Jason designed reusable 3D scenes for an interactive narrative sandbox game engine.

Active: Fall 2018 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Rishav Rajendra

Rishav designed reusable 3D scenes for an interactive narrative sandbox game engine.

Active: Fall 2018 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Lee Lagarde

Lee designed reusable 3D scenes for an interactive narrative sandbox game engine.

Active: Fall 2018 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Dharmesh Rajendra Desai

Dharmesh earned his M.S. in Computer Science in 2017. His thesis explored how virtual reality technology can improve the experience of presence in intelligent interactive training simulations such as a police use-of-force training program.

Active: Spring 2016 to Spring 2017 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans

Dharmesh Rajendra Desai's Publications

Nicholas Martin

Nicholas worked on developing a simple mobile game for data-driven assessment of mathematical reasoning in middle school children.

Active: Spring 2017 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Nishan Rayamajhee

Nishan worked on developing a simple mobile game for data-driven assessment of mathematical reasoning in middle school children.

Active: Spring 2017 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Oluwatosin King

Tosin worked on intelligent assessment of gameplay data for education.

Active: Fall 2016 to Spring 2017 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans

Scott Robertson

Scott worked on a human subjects trial for evaluating how people reason hypothetically when reading a narrative.

Active: Spring 2016 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Scott Robertson's Publications

Abhishek Sapkota

Abhishek participating in the UNO College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Program. He worked on developing simple games for assessment of middle school education.

Active: Spring 2016 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Pujan Pokhrel

Pujan participated in the UNO College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Program. He worked on developing simple games for assessment of middle school education.

Active: Spring 2016 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Ashim Sitoula

Ashim participated in the UNO College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Program. He worked on developing simple games for assessment of middle school education.

Active: Spring 2016 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Rodrigo Rodrigues do Carmo

Rodrigo, a member of the Brazil Scientific Mobility Program, worked on intelligent game-based assessment tools for middle school children, including Reading Rocket and the web data collection framework.

Active: Spring 2015 to Summer 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Maurice Robert III

Maurice worked on a web-based data collection and user management framework for intelligent game-based assessment tools, including Reading Rocket and Reading Raid.

Active: Summer 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Gabriel Miranda Pedrosa

Gabriel, a member of the Brazil Scientific Mobility Program, worked on Reading Raid, an intelligent game-based assessment tool for middle school children.

Active: Summer 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Thiago Vieira De Alcantara Silva

Thiago, a member of the Brazil Scientific Mobility Program, worked on Reading Raid, an intelligent game-based assessment tool for middle school children.

Active: Summer 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Gabriel Queiroz

Gabriel, a member of the Brazil Scientific Mobility Program, worked on Reading Rocket, an intelligent game-based assessment tool for middle school children.

Active: Spring 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Chris Toups

Chris added feature to The Best Laid Plans to improve gameplay and make it more interactive.

Active: Spring 2015 as an undergraduate student at the University of New Orleans

Chris Kives

Chris worked on measuring the salience of events in plan-based intelligent storytelling.

Active: Fall 2014 to Spring 2015 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans

Kyle Whittington

Kyle worked on developing a mobile app for the popular card game Cards Against Humanity.

Active: Fall 2014 to Spring 2015 as a graduate student at the University of New Orleans