Julie Ann McCann is a Northern Irish computer scientist who is a professor at

Imperial College London Imperial College London, also known as Imperial, is a Public university, public research university in London, England. Its history began with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, who envisioned a Al ...

. She is the leader of the Adaptive Emergent Systems Engineering. She is a Fellow of the

British Computer Society image:Maurice Vincent Wilkes 1980 (3).jpg, Sir Maurice Wilkes served as the first President of BCS in 1957. The British Computer Society (BCS), branded BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, since 2009, is a professional body and a learned ...

and was awarded the

Suffrage Science award The Suffrage Science award is a prize for women in science, engineering and computing founded in 2011, on the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day by the MRC London Institute of Medical Sciences (LMS). There are three categories of awar ...

in 2018.

Early life and education

As a teenager, McCann became interested in

electronic music Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...

, particularly listening to

Kraftwerk Kraftwerk (, ) is a Germany, German Electronic music, electronic band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk was among the first successful a ...

and

Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groun ...

. She lived close to the Armagh Planetarium in

Armagh Armagh ( ; , , " Macha's height") is a city and the county town of County Armagh, in Northern Ireland, as well as a civil parish. It is the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland – the seat of the Archbishops of Armagh, the Primates of All ...

. She joined

Ulster University Ulster University (; Ulster Scots: or ), legally the University of Ulster, is a multi-campus public research university located in Northern Ireland. It is often referred to informally and unofficially as Ulster, or by the abbreviation UU. It i ...

for her academic studies, working toward a bachelor's and doctorate in computer science. She completed her doctorate in 1992.

Research and career

McCann develops

spatial computing Spatial computing is any of various 3D human–computer interaction techniques that are perceived by users as taking place in the real world, in and around their natural bodies and physical environments, instead of constrained to and perceptually ...

and

wireless communications Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information (''telecommunication'') between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided mediu ...

, which combine information from their environments with their digital components. Her group investigate convergence and anarchical spatial computing systems. To better understand this, she uses established understanding from systems beyond computing infrastructure (e.g. economics, biology, physics). She combines decentralised algorithms and protocols using low-powered sensing devices. These devices are very small and communicate with one another via radio signals. McCann joined

in 2002 from

City, University of London City, University of London was a public university from 1966 to 2024 in London, England. It merged with St George's, University of London to form City St George's, University of London in August 2024. The names "City, University of London" an ...

. She works on Adaptive Emergent Systems Engineering. Her interests lie in harnessing the various interactions between the cyber and physical to improve performance, resilience and to make secure. She oversees the

Alan Turing Institute The Alan Turing Institute is the United Kingdom's national institute for data science and artificial intelligence, founded in 2015 and largely funded by the UK government. It is named after Alan Turing, the British mathematician and computing p ...

Resilient and Robust Infrastructure challenge. McCann leads the National Research Foundation Singapore Eco Cities initiative. McCann also serves as deputy director of the PETRAS National Centre of Excellence.

Awards and honours

* 2018

* 2022

Turing Talk The Turing Talk, previously known as the Turing Lecture, is an annual award lecture delivered by a noted speaker on the subject of Computer Science. Sponsored and co-hosted by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) and the British Comp ...

Selected publications

Her publications include: * * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:McCann, Julie British computer scientists Fellows of the British Computer Society Alumni of Imperial College London Academics of City, University of London Academics of Imperial College London Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Alumni of Ulster University Scientists from County Armagh