Sir Nigel Richard Shadbolt (born 9 April 1956) is Principal of

Jesus College, Oxford Jesus College (in full: Jesus College in the University of Oxford of Queen Elizabeth's Foundation) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is in the centre of the city, on a site between Turl Street, Ship ...

,Jesus College, Oxford. Election of Next Principal. 15 July 2014
/ref> and Professorial

Research Fellow A research fellow is an academic research position at a university or a similar research institution, usually for academic staff or faculty members. A research fellow may act either as an independent investigator or under the supervision of a p ...

in the

Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford The Department of Computer Science is the computer science department of the University of Oxford, England, which is part of the university's Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences Division. It was founded in 1957 as the Computing Laboratory. ...

. He is chairman of the

Open Data Institute The Open Data Institute (ODI) is a non-profit private company limited by guarantee, based in the United Kingdom. Founded by Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Sir Nigel Shadbolt in 2012, the ODI's mission is to connect, equip and inspire people around the ...

which he co-founded with

Tim Berners-Lee Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee (born 8 June 1955), also known as TimBL, is an English computer scientist best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web, the HTML markup language, the URL system, and HTTP. He is a professorial research fellow a ...

. He is also a visiting professor in the School of Electronics and Computer Science at the

University of Southampton The University of Southampton (abbreviated as ''Soton'' in post-nominal letters) is a public university, public research university in Southampton, England. Southampton is a founding member of the Russell Group of research-intensive universit ...

. Shadbolt is an interdisciplinary researcher, policy expert and commentator. His research focuses on understanding how intelligent behaviour is embodied and emerges in humans, machines and, most recently, on the Web, and has made contributions to the fields of

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

cognitive science Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary, scientific study of the mind and its processes. It examines the nature, the tasks, and the functions of cognition (in a broad sense). Mental faculties of concern to cognitive scientists include percep ...

computational neuroscience Computational neuroscience (also known as theoretical neuroscience or mathematical neuroscience) is a branch of neuroscience which employs mathematics, computer science, theoretical analysis and abstractions of the brain to understand th ...

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of computer, computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making. It is a field of re ...

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

and the emerging field of

web science Web science is an emerging interdisciplinary field concerned with the study of large-scale socio-technical systems, particularly the World Wide Web. It considers the relationship between people and technology, the ways that society and technolo ...

.Shadbolt, Nigel and Hampson, Roger (2018), ''The Digital Ape'',

Scribe Publications Scribe Publications (or simply Scribe) is an independent publishing house founded by Henry Rosenbloom in Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cit ...

, London, UK

Education

Shadbolt was born in London but adopted and raised in the Derbyshire village of

Ashford-in-the-Water Ashford-in-the-Water is a village and civil parish in the Derbyshire Peak District, England. The village is on the River Wye, north-west of Bakewell. It is known for the quarrying of Ashford Black Marble (a form of limestone), and for the ma ...

, living a "bucolic existence" until he went to university. He went to

Lady Manners School Lady Manners School is an English secondary school located in Bakewell, a market town in the Peak District National Park, Derbyshire. It was founded on 20 May 1636 by Grace, Lady Manners, who lived at Haddon Hall, the current home of Lord and ...

, then a state-funded

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a Latin school, school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented Se ...

. He obtained an

undergraduate degree An undergraduate degree (also called first degree or simply degree) is a colloquial term for an academic degree earned by a person who has completed undergraduate courses. In the United States, it is usually offered at an institution of higher ed ...

in philosophy and

from

Newcastle University Newcastle University (legally the University of Newcastle upon Tyne) is a public research university based in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It has overseas campuses in Singapore and Malaysia. The university is a red brick university and a mem ...

, then received his Ph.D. from the Department of Artificial Intelligence at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...

. His thesis resulted in a framework for understanding how human dialogue is organised and was supervised by Barry Richards and Henry S. Thompson.

Research and career

Shadbolt's research has been in

Artificial Intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of computer, computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making. It is a field of re ...

since the late 1970s working on a broad range of topics; from

natural language understanding Natural language understanding (NLU) or natural language interpretation (NLI) is a subset of natural language processing in artificial intelligence that deals with machine reading comprehension. NLU has been considered an AI-hard problem. Ther ...

and

robotics Robotics is the interdisciplinary study and practice of the design, construction, operation, and use of robots. Within mechanical engineering, robotics is the design and construction of the physical structures of robots, while in computer s ...

through to

expert systems In artificial intelligence (AI), an expert system is a computer system emulating the decision-making ability of a human expert. Expert systems are designed to solve complex problems by Automated reasoning system, reasoning through bodies of knowl ...

memory Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information is encoded, stored, and retrieved when needed. It is the retention of information over time for the purpose of influencing future action. If past events could not be remembe ...

through to the

semantic web The Semantic Web, sometimes known as Web 3.0, is an extension of the World Wide Web through standards set by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The goal of the Semantic Web is to make Internet data machine-readable. To enable the encoding o ...

and

linked data In computing, linked data is structured data which is interlinked with other data so it becomes more useful through semantic queries. It builds upon standard Web technologies such as HTTP, RDF and URIs, but rather than using them to serve web ...

. He also writes on the wider implications of his research. One example is the book he co-authored with Kieron O'Hara that examines privacy and trust in the Digital Age – ''The Spy in the Coffee Machine''. His most recent research is on the topic of

social machine A social machine is an environment comprising humans and technology interacting and producing outputs or action which would not be possible without both parties present. It can also be regarded as a machine, in which specific tasks are performed ...

s – understanding the emergent problem solving that arises from a combination of humans, computers and data at web scale. The SOCIAM project on

social machines A social machine is an environment comprising humans and technology interacting and producing outputs or action which would not be possible without both parties present. It can also be regarded as a machine, in which specific tasks are performed ...

is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).UK Government grants awarded to Nigel Shadbolt
via

Research Councils UK Research Councils UK, sometimes known as RCUK, was a non-departmental public body that coordinated science policy in the United Kingdom from 2002 to 2018. It was an umbrella organisation that coordinated the seven separate research councils ...

In 1983, Shadbolt moved to the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public research university in Nottingham, England. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. Nottingham's main campus (University Park Campus, Nottingh ...

and joined the Department of Psychology. From 2000 to 2015 he was professor of

in the School of Electronics and Computer Science at the

. From 2000 to 2007, he led and directed the Advanced Knowledge Technologies (AKT) Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration (IRC). It produced a broad range of Semantic Web research, including how diverse information could be harvested and integrated and how semantics could help computers systems recommend content. In 2006 Shadbolt was elected a

Fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

of the

Royal Academy of Engineering The Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) is the United Kingdom's national academy of engineering. The Academy was founded in June 1976 as the Fellowship of Engineering with support from Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who became the first senio ...

(FREng). He is a Fellow of the British Computer Society (FBCS) and was its President in its 50th jubilee year. That same year, Nigel Shadbolt,

Wendy Hall Dame Wendy Hall (born 25 October 1952) is a British computer scientist. She is Regius Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton. Early life and education Wendy Hall was born in west London and educated at Ealing Grammar ...

and Daniel Weitzner, founded the

Web Science Research Initiative Web most often refers to: * Spider web, a silken structure created by the animal * World Wide Web or the Web, an Internet-based hypertext system Web, WEB, or the Web may also refer to: Computing * WEB, a literate programming system created by ...

, to promote the discipline of

Web Science Web science is an emerging interdisciplinary field concerned with the study of large-scale socio-technical systems, particularly the World Wide Web. It considers the relationship between people and technology, the ways that society and technolo ...

and foster research collaboration between the

and

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

. From 2007 to 2011 Shadbolt was deputy head of the School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS) at the

, from 2011 to 2014 he was head of the Web and Internet Science Group, the first research group dedicated to the study of

Web science Web science is an emerging interdisciplinary field concerned with the study of large-scale socio-technical systems, particularly the World Wide Web. It considers the relationship between people and technology, the ways that society and technolo ...

and

Internet science Internet science is an interdisciplinary science that examines all aspects of the co-evolution in Internet networks and society. It works in the intersection of and in the gaps among a wide range of disciplines that have had to respond to the impac ...

, within ECS, comprising 140 staff, researchers and PhD students. His Semantic Web research led to the formation of Garlik, offering identity protection services. In 2008, Garlik was awarded Technology Pioneer status by the Davos World Economic Forum and won the UK BT Flagship IT Award.

Experian Experian plc is a multinational corporation, multinational data broker and consumer credit reporting company headquartered in Dublin, Ireland. Experian collects and aggregates information on more than 1 billion people and businesses including ...

acquired Garlik in November 2011. In June 2009 he was appointed together with

as Information Advisor to the UK Government. The two led a team to develop

data.gov.uk data.gov.uk is a UK Government project to make available non-personal UK government data as open data. It was launched as closed beta in , and publicly launched in . As of February 2015, it contained over 19,343 datasets, rising to over 40,000 ...

, a single point of access for UK non-personal Governmental public data. In May 2010 he was appointed by the UK Coalition Government to the Public Sector Transparency Board responsible for setting open data standards across the public sector and developing the legal Right to Data. In December 2012, Shadbolt and Tim Berners-Lee formally launched the

. The ODI focuses on incubating and nurturing new businesses wanting to harness open data, training and promoting standards. In 2013, Shadbolt and Tim Berners-Lee joined the board of advisors of tech startup

State.com State is a semantic web platform created by London, UK-based Equal Media Ltd. Announced in 2013, and launched in 2014, State aims to build a global opinion network using natural language processing, databases and sentiment analysis. It seeks t ...

, creating a network of structured opinions on the semantic web. On 1 August 2015 he was appointed principal of

and a professorial research fellow in the

. He is also a Pro-vice-chancellor without portfolio at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

. He will step down from his role at Jesus College in July 2026 upon reaching the age of 70.

Appointments

* 2008–present: Director, Web Science Trust * 2010–2015: Chair of Local Public Data Panel, Department of Communities and Local Government. * 2011–2014: Chair of UK Midata programme, BIS, appointed by the Minister of State. The Midata programme was an element of the

consumer A consumer is a person or a group who intends to order, or use purchased goods, products, or services primarily for personal, social, family, household and similar needs, who is not directly related to entrepreneurial or business activities. ...

empowerment strategy put in place by the 2010-2015

coalition government A coalition government, or coalition cabinet, is a government by political parties that enter into a power-sharing arrangement of the executive. Coalition governments usually occur when no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an ...

. * 2012–2016: UK Health Sector Transparency Board, DHS. * 2013–2015: UK Research Sector Transparency Board, appointed by Minister of State * 2013–2015: UK Information Economy Council, BIS, appointed by Minister of State * 2015–2016: Chair, Shadbolt Review of Computer Science Employability * 2015–2016: UK French Data Task Force, appointed by Chancellor of Exchequer * 2015–present: Member, HMG Digital Advisory Board. Appointed by Minister of State

Awards and honours

* * * * * * * * * 2014: Appointed EPSRC RISE (Recognising Inspirational Scientists and Engineers) Fellow * 2016: Elected first

Jisc Jisc is a United Kingdom not-for-profit organisation that provides network and IT services and digital resources in support of further and higher education and research, as well as the public sector. Its head office is based in Bristol with ...

* 2017: Elected Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) Shadbolt was interviewed by

Jim Al-Khalili Jameel Sadik "Jim" Al-Khalili (; born 20 September 1962) is an Iraqi-British theoretical physicist and science populariser. He is professor of theoretical physics and chair in the public engagement in science at the University of Surrey. He is a ...

on ''

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Jim Al-Khalili, in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of a living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili and the featur ...

'' on

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

in April 2015. In 2016, he delivered the Hinton Lecture of the

, entitled "Engineering the Future of Data".

Personal life

Shadbolt is married to Bev Saunders, a designer, and has two children.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shadbolt, Nigel Richard 1956 births Living people Scientists from London Alumni of Newcastle University Alumni of the University of Edinburgh English computer scientists Academics of the University of Nottingham Academics of the University of Southampton Fellows of the British Computer Society Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering Knights Bachelor Presidents of the British Computer Society Principals of Jesus College, Oxford Members of the Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford Semantic Web people Fellows of the Royal Society People educated at Lady Manners School Pro-vice-chancellors of the University of Oxford