Gerardo I. Simari, a former researcher in the department, has been included in IEEE Intelligent Systems' "AI's 10 to Watch" list for 2016. This award recognizes young scientists (who earned their PhDs within the last five years) for their contributions to the field of Artificial Intelligence early in their careers. While at Oxford, Simari worked in the Information Systems group on topics centred on knowledge representation and reasoning; in particular, he helped develop extensions of existing ontology languages by incorporating probabilities, preferences, and group decision making in the context of a Google Research Award and the PrOQAW EPSRC grant. 

Simari is currently an assistant professor at Universidad Nacional del Sur in Bahia Blanca and a researcher at CONICET, Argentina.  After obtaining his PhD in Computer Science at University of Maryland College Park, he came to Oxford as a postdoctoral research assistant and then a senior researcher; during his time here, he was also a Fulford Junior Research Fellow of Somerville College.