The AI Disruption Speaker Series: Xuan Wang
Xuan Wang will present "Towards Small, Open-Source, Multi-Modal Language Model Agents for Science and Society."
Dr. Xuan Wang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech. Her research interests are in natural language processing, data mining, AI for sciences, and AI for healthcare. She was a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award 2025, Nvidia Academic Grant 2025, Cisco Research Award 2025, NSF NAIRR Pilot Award 2024 - 2025, and NAACL Best Demo Paper Award 2021. She received a Ph.D. degree in Computer Science, an M.S. degree in Statistics, and an M.S. degree in Biochemistry from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2022, 2017, and 2015, respectively, and a B.S. degree in Biological Science from Tsinghua University in 2013.
Abstract:
Recent advances in large language models have shown impressive capabilities across scientific domains and societal applications, but their size and proprietary nature often limit accessibility and reproducibility. In this talk, I will present our work on developing small, open-source, multi-modal language model agents that can reason, plan, and act in diverse scientific and societal contexts. I will discuss methods for designing small but highly effective language models, integrating multi-modal inputs, and coordinating multi-agent interactions to achieve complex tasks. I will also highlight real-world applications in science and society, emphasizing transparency, reproducibility, and accessibility.
About the speaker series:
The CIRSS Speaker Series continues in Fall on the new theme of “The AI Disruption.” Our speakers will discuss how recent advances in AI have reshaped their research — what has been made easier and what has become more difficult — and reflect upon its broader disruptive impact on society.
We meet most Wednesdays, 9am-10am Central time, in Zoom. Everyone is welcome to attend. More information, including upcoming speaker schedule and links to recordings, is available on the series webpage. For weekly updates on upcoming talks, subscribe to our CIRSS Seminars mailing list. Our Fall series is led by Yuanxi Fu and Timothy McPhillips, and supported by the Center for Informatics Research in Science and Scholarship (CIRSS) and the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
This event is sponsored by Center for Informatics Research in Science and Scholarship