Some bugs just don't want to be squished, so learn to love them.

Dr. Raluca D. Gaina is currently a Lecturer in Game AI at Queen Mary University of London, where she obtained her Ph.D. in Intelligent Games and Games Intelligence in May 2021 (in the area of rolling horizon evolution in general video game playing). She has led innovative research in Simulation-Based decision-making and modern Tabletop Games, laying the foundation for the Tabletop Games Framework (TAG). She has co-organised top Game AI conferences, tutorials and competitions, most recently promoting AI research on the cooperative board game “Pandemic” through an IEEE CIS-funded competition. She has over 30 publications in leading Game AI conferences (AAAI, COG) and journals (TOG), and received multiple awards for her public engagement videos. Her research interests include general video game playing AI, evolutionary algorithms and tabletop games.

She completed a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Computer Games at the University of Essex in 2015 and 2016, respectively. In 2018, she did a 3-month internship at Microsoft Research Cambridge, working on the Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning in Malmo Competition (MARLO). She was the track organiser of the Two-Player General Video Game AI Competition (GVGAI) 2016-2019 and was the Vice-Chair for Conferences of the IEEE CIS Games Technical Committee in 2020.

Find out more of what I get up to on the blog.

Read an interview about my PhD experience here.

AWARDS

QMUL Virtual Learning Environment Expo Innovative Idea Winner, QMUL, 2022

TELT Newsletter


Best Artifact Award, AIIDE, Atlanta, 2019

Paper: Analysis of Statistical Forward Planning Methods in Pommerman (Artifact)


Best PC Member Nomination, AIIDE, Atlanta, 2019


Video Competition, IEEE CoG, London, 2019

2nd Place - Video : Project Thyia: A Forever Gameplayer


Video Competition, IEEE CIG, Maastricht, 2018

3rd Place - Video : General Win Prediction from Agent Experience


Best Paper Award Nomination, IEEE CIG, Maastricht, 2018

Runner-up - Paper: General Win Prediction from Agent Experience


IEEE Present Around The World Competition, University of Essex, 2017

Runner-up


IET Game AI Hackathon Competition, University of Essex, 2017

Runner-up Best Game Design


MSc Project Prize in the area of Computer Science, University of Essex, 2016

Awarded for the highest mark obtained in an MSc project in the CSEE department.


K.F Bowden Memorial prize, University of Essex, 2014

Awarded for achieving one of the top four overall highest marks in the second year in the CSEE department.


K.F Bowden Memorial prize, University of Essex, 2013

Awarded for achieving one of the top four overall highest marks in the first year in the CSEE department.


FUNDING

Global Game Jam (GGJ) scholarship for attending the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2020, 2020
AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-19) Travel Grant Award, 2019
AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment (AIIDE) Travel Grant Award, 2018
EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Intelligent Games and Game Intelligence (IGGI) Grant, 2016-2020
Postgraduate Support Scheme 10k Grant, University of Essex, 2015