About us

The Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence (AIxIA) is a non-profit scientific association founded in 1988 with the aim of promoting the research and dissemination of the techniques related to Artificial Intelligence.

The list of former AIxIA Presidents is as follows:

• Luigia Carlucci Aiello
• Oliviero Stock
• Piero Torasso
• Marco Gori
• Roberto Serra
• Marco Schaerf
• Paola Mello
• Amedeo Cesta
• Piero Poccianti (in office)

The Association has been organizing scientific events and meetings for its members since its foundation; conferences have been organized in the even years, while congresses have been organized in the odd years.

The past scientific events were held at:

1. Ancona 1988
2. Rome 1990
3. Genova 1992
4. Parma 1994
5. Naples 1996
6. Padova 1998
7. Milan 2000
8. Siena 2002
9. Perugia 2004
10. In 2006, as the AIxIA hosted the European Artificial Intelligence Conference (ECAI 2006) in Riva del Garda (TN), no further event was organized
11. Cagliari 2008
12. Brescia 2010
13. Rome 2012
14. Pisa 2014

Since 2006, a unified event has been taking place every year under the form of a Scientific Congress. The historical series of the AIxIA Congresses is shown below:

1. Trento 1989
2. Palermo 1991
3. Turin 1993
4. Florence 1995
5. Rome 1997
6. Bologna 1999
7. Bari 2001
8. Pisa 2003
9. Milan 2005
10. Rome 2007
11. Reggio Emilia 2009
12. Palermo 2011
13. Turin 2013
14. Ferrara 2015
15. Genova 2016
16. Bari 2017
17. Trento 2018

The Association aims at increasing the knowledge of Artificial Intelligence, fostering its teaching, and promoting both theoretical and applied research in the field through seminars, targeted initiatives and sponsorship of events.

Within the Association there exist a number of working groups focused on specific research topics. Eight working groups are active at the moment, focusing on the following areas: agent and multi-agent systems, artificial intelligence and aging, artificial intelligence for cultural heritage, robotics, machine learning and data mining, knowledge representation and automated reasoning, natural language processing, argumentation.

The Association organizes an annual scientific event, as well as other initiatives directed to the public and to the industrial world; it issues awards and scholarships to encourage the participation of students and young researchers in the events that are held in Italy.

Currently, the association has over 1000 members.

AIxIA is a member of the European Association for Artificial Intelligence EurAI (formerly known as ECCAI). The EurAI was founded in 1982 as a representative organization of the European AI community, with the aim of promoting the study, research and application of Artificial Intelligence in Europe.

In the even years, EurAI in cooperation with the member associations, organizes the European conference on Artificial Intelligence, called ECAI. In the odd years, it organizes an advanced summer school on AI issues, called ACAI).

EurAI annually awards research grants and prizes to its members, on the basis of reports received from national companies and from members of its own board:

• Distinguished service award: awarded every two years to a person who distinguished himself for exceptional contributions to the European AI community
• EurAI fellows: recognition given annually to European researchers who have distinguished themselves for exceptional contributions to the AI research area.
• Dissertation award: awarded to the best European doctoral thesis on the AI topic.

Members of the AIxIA are entitled to the services offered by EurAI, which include:

1. Discounted registration to the events organized by EurAI, in particular the ECAI conference and the ACAI school.
2. Access to the electronic version of the IOS Press AI Communication magazine, official journal of the EurAI – European Association for Artificial Intelligence.
3. Free access to the Artificial Intelligence Journal, upon registration on the site http://aij.ijcai.org/index.php/free-access-to-the-ai-journal.

The international awards obtained by the AIxIA members are listed below.

EurAI Distinguished Service Award:

• Luigia Carlucci Aiello, Università di Roma “La Sapienza” (2014)

IJCAI Donald E. Walker Distinguished Service Award:

• Luigia Carlucci Aiello, University of Rome “La Sapienza” (2009)

EurAI Fellows:

• Giovanni Adorni, University of Genoa
• Diego Calvanese, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano
• Luigia Carlucci Aiello, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Cristiano Castelfranchi, Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, CNR
• Amedeo Cesta, Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, CNR
• Floriana Esposito, University of Bari
• Nicola Gatti, Politecnico di Milano
• Giuseppe de Giacomo, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Alfonso Gerevini, University of Brescia
• Fausto Giunchiglia, University of Trento
• Marco Gori, University of Siena
• Gianluigi Greco, University of Calabria
• Nicola Guarino, Italian National Research Council
• Maurizio Lenzerini, University of Rome
• Nicola Leone, University of Calabria
• Alberto Martelli, University of Torino
• Paola Mello, University of Bologna
• Daniele Nardi, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Riccardo Rosati, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Francesca Rossi, University of Padova
• Luciano Serafini, Fondazione Bruno Kessler
• Lorenza Saitta, University of Torino
• Oliviero Stock, FBK
• Paolo Traverso, ITC/IRST

In Memoriam

• Pietro Torasso, University of Torino

AAAI Fellows:

• Maurizio Lenzerini, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Giuseppe de Giacomo, University of Rome “La Sapienza”
• Francesca Rossi, University of Padova
• Oliviero Stock, FBK
• Luigia Carlucci Aiello, University of Rome “La Sapienza”