Amir H. Karimi

Bio

Dr. Amir-Hossein Karimi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering with cross-appointment at the Cheriton School of Computer Science of the University of Waterloo at the University of Waterloo, and a Vector Institute Faculty Affiliate. He leads the Collaborative Human-AI Reasoning Machines (CHARM) Lab, dedicated to pioneering advances in AI to facilitate trustworthy human-AI collaborations.

Dr. Karimi's scholarly contributions have been showcased almost exclusively at top-tier AI and ML venues including NeurIPS, ICML, AAAI, AISTATS, ACM FAccT, and ACM AIES. He has authored influential publications such as a comprehensive survey paper in the prestigious ACM Computing Surveys, holds a patent, and is a contributing author of a book chapter. Dr. Karimi’s work on algorithmic recourse has notably elevated its prominence in responsible AI research, with its presence growing from almost none to hundreds on Google Scholar in just five years; algorithmic recourse is now a mandatory criterion in key sectors, including Canada’s Treasury Board Directive on Automated Decision-Making. Besides highlighted presentations at the aforementioned venues and serving on their respective conference program committees, numerous academic and industry research labs have invited Dr. Karimi to present talks, lectures, and tutorials. His invited talks span institutions like University College London, ETH Zurich, Cyber Valley Health, Harvard University, MIT, Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms (MILA), Institute of Mathematical Statistics, NEC Europe Labs, DeepMind, and Google Brain. Notably, Dr. Karimi gave a tutorial on Causal Explainable AI at KDD 2023 and one on Algorithmic Recourse at the Toronto ML Summit 2024. Committed to knowledge mobilization and reproducibility, his open-source code has earned over 100 GitHub stars.

Dr. Karimi is a firm believer in the strength of diverse perspectives and is dedicated to building inclusive spaces in academia and beyond. As a professor, he strives to inspire the next generation of AI researchers and engineers, helping them understand and responsibly apply the power of AI. Further emphasizing his commitment to inclusive learning, he co-founded "Prince of AI," an initiative that provides free education on basic and advanced AI topics to a community of over 30,000 individuals. This initiative aims to reduce barriers to education and offer opportunities to those who traditionally lack access. With a wealth of content equivalent to an introductory ML course, their platform facilitates active learning through technical posts, engaging video reels, and interactive webinars.

Prior to joining UWaterloo, Dr. Karimi accumulated significant industry experience at leading tech companies such as BlackBerry, Meta (Facebook), Google Brain, and DeepMind, and provided consulting services for various startups and incubators including for NEXT AI. His contributions have earned him multiple accolades, such as the UofToronto Spirit of Engineering Science Award (2015), the UWaterloo Alumni Gold Medal Award (2018), the NSERC Canada Graduate Scholarship - Doctorate (2018), the Google PhD Fellowship (2021), the ETH Zurich Medal (2024), the NSERC Discovery Grants (2024), and the Igor Ivkovic Teaching Excellence Award (2024).

✨CHARM Lab✨

The mandate of the Collaborative Human-AI Reasoning Machines (CHARM) Lab is to enhance the integration of AI systems into human decision-making, ensuring they are not only powerful but also safe, reliable, and aligned with human values. As AI becomes more embedded in everyday life, e.g., 🏥 healthcare, 🎓 education, 💼 finance, and 🚗 transportation, our dependency on these systems grows, and so does the risk of potential consequential errors. Our mission is to develop AI systems that can detect 🕵️‍♂️ potential issues, correct 🛠️ mistakes, and ultimately perfect 🤝 human-AI partnership where humans and machines work together seamlessly to achieve better outcomes. 🌍✨

The CHARM Lab focuses on causal inference, explainable AI, and neuro-symbolic approaches in order to build systems that allow users to understand, challenge, and improve AI decisions. We occasionally also borrow insights from, and collaborate with leading experts in, such fields as social sciences, cognitive science, human-computer interaction, multi-agent reinforcement learning, game theory, and behavioral economics.

Current Members

Amir-Hossein Karimi

Principal Investigator (PI)

Mina Kebriaee

PhD Student
(w/ Prof. Tahvildari)

Zahra Khotanlou

PhD Student

Maryam Ghorbansabagh

Master's Student
(w/ Prof. Grossmann)

Zachary Wu

Research Assistant
(w/ Prof. Tahvildari)

Lab Alumni

Abubakar Bello

Research Assistant
(next: Microsoft Inc.)

Mohammadreza Alavi

Research Assistant

Past Mentees

Ahmad Ehyaei

Mentee (w/ Prof. Farnadi)
(next: Intl. Max Planck Research Schools)

Miriam Rateike

Mentee (w/ Prof. Valera)
(next: Google PhD Fellow 2023)

Maryam Yalsavar

Mentee (w/ Prof. Ghodsi)
(next: Huawei)

Ricardo Dominguez-Olmedo

Mentee (w/ Prof. Schölkopf)
(next: Intl. Max Planck Research Schools)

Kiarash Mohammadi

Mentee (w/ Prof. Valera)
(next: MILA AI Institute)

Alexandra Walter

Mentee (w/ Prof. Valera)
(next: Helmholtz Data Sci. Sch. of Health)

Teaching

General Content

Prince of AI

Learn for Free | Courses

Success Studio

Read on Medium

AI for Autism

Listen on BBC Podcasts

University Courses

Intro to Machine Learning

Get the Slides

CausEthical Machine Learning

Seminar | Workshop

Dimension Reduction & PCA

Watch on YouTube

Specialized Tutorials

Algorithmic Recourse

Watch on YouTube

Causal Explainable AI

Get the slides

Vitæ

Having immigrated five times across three continents for studies and work, from Iran to Canada, and then onward to the USA, Germany, Switzerland, and the UK, Dr. Amir-Hossein Karimi has accumulated over 15 years of technical experience in both research and industry roles. Now an Assistant Professor at the University of Waterloo and a Vector Institute Faculty Affiliate, he has held prominent research positions at Google DeepMind, Google Brain, alongside software engineering roles at BlackBerry and Meta (Facebook). His academic journey includes a Ph.D. at the Max Planck Institute & ETH Zürich, with a focus on causal inference and explainable AI. Full CV in PDF.

• UWaterloo & Vector Institute Sep 2023 - Present

  Assistant Professor
  Electrical and Computer Engineering Department
• Google DeepMind May 2022 - Oct 2022

  Research Scientist Intern
  Mentors: Dr. Lars Buesing, Dr. Jessica Hamrick, David Amos
• Google Brain Dec 2021 - Apr 2022

  Research Scientist Intern
  Mentors: Dr. Been Kim, Dr. Simon Kornblith
• Max Planck Institute & ETH Zürich Oct 2018 - Aug 2023

  Ph.D. Student in Computer Science
  Advisors: Prof. Bernhard Schölkopf, Prof. Isabel Valera
• University of Waterloo Sep 2016 - Aug 2018

  M.Math in Computer Science
  Advisors: Prof. Alexander Wong, Prof. Ali Ghodsi
• Meta (Facebook) Inc. Aug 2015 - Sep 2016

  Software Engineer
  Mentors: Dr. Antoine Bordes, Dr. Jason Weston, Kaustubh Karkare
• Meta (Facebook) Inc. Feb 2014 - Apr 2014

  Software Engineer Intern
  Mentor: Chris Triolo
• BlackBerry Inc. May 2013 - Dec 2013

  Software Engineer Intern
  Mentor: Chris Joe
• Stanford University May 2012 - Aug 2012

  Undergraduate Research Assistant
  Advisor: Prof. Amin Arbabian
• University of Toronto Sep 2010 - May 2015

  B.A.Sc. in Engineering Science – Electrical and Computer Stream
  Advisors: Prof. Chris Eliasmith, Prof. Richard Zemel

Press, Funding, & Consultations

Dr. Karimi is grateful for the generous funding support from the University of Waterloo, NSERC, Google, and Waterloo.AI, enabling his team to push the boundaries of human-AI research.

In addition to his academic contributions, Dr. Karimi has consulted internationally for several startups, leveraging his expertise for discovery, product-market fit, and scaling of operations, in addition to fundraising and grant writing . He is available to discuss how his research and experience can deliver value to your organization and stakeholders.

For press inquiries, feel free to reach out.