Arun Kumar Sharma

Arun Sharma is an Indian Australian computer science professor. He is a distinguished emeritus professor at the Queensland University of Technology and chairs the Council of QIMR Berghofer. He is the Group Head for Sustainability and Climate Change, and Advisor to the Chairman of Adani Group. He was a cofounder of Australia's National ICT Research Centre of Excellence (NICTA), and Director of the Translational Research Institute (Australia). In the course of his institutional duties, Sharma played a significant role in the development of Australian technology research capability, the promotion of translational research in agriculture and biosciences within Queensland, and the fostering of international technological research cooperation between Australia and India. Sharma's professional achievements have been recognized by awards by the Premier of Queensland, the Office of the Chief Scientist (Australia), the India Australia Business & Community Awards (IABCA), the Birla Institute of Technology & Science, and the Royal Order of Australia. He was born in the town of Banmankhi in the Indian state of Bihar.

Education Sharma completed All-India Secondary (1978) and Senior School (1980) Certificates in Goalpara, Assam and New Delhi. He obtained a Master of Science degree in Computer Science from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani in 1985, Sharma is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (2008).

Career

Sharma began his academic career as a research and teaching assistant while still a graduate student at Buffalo, and was a research assistant for a year at the Department of Computer and Information Sciences, University of Delaware (1989-1990) prior to completing his Ph.D. Shortly after his doctorate degree, he was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate at the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology for 6 months (1990-1991).

Since 2011 he has been associated with the Adani Group, where he has been a Member of the Board, North Queensland Export Terminal Limited (previously Adani Abbot Point Terminal Ltd), and (since 2020) Group Head of Sustainability and Climate Change, and Advisor to the Chairman.

Sharma's research contributions have been at the intersection of Theoretical Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, especially the fields of Computational Learning Theory and Algorithmic Learning Theory that focus on mathematical frameworks for analyzing the capability and limits of Machine Learning. During the 1990s, Sharma had a very productive collaboration with Professor Sanjay Jain that led to significant new results in E Mark Gold's paradigm of language identification in the limit. As a result of these contributions, Jain and Sharma were invited by MIT Press to coauthor the second edition of the classic first edition of the book Systems That Learn by Osherson, Stob, and Weinstein. He was a member of the World Economic Forum's Global Future Council on Innovation Ecosystems. He was the Champion of Team Queensland that participated in the MIT Regional Entrepreneurship Acceleration Program (REAP).

Through his policy papers and newspaper articles, Sharma has played a significant role in doctrinal advocacy at the intersection of research, entrepreneurship and economic development.

Publications

Books

Authored

Systems that learn: an introduction to learning theory. S, Jain, D. N. Osherson, J. S. Royer & A. Sharma (Authors), 2nd ed., Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. 1999. . . The book has been favorably reviewed by Robert H. Sloan, Rūsiņš Mārtiņš Freivalds and Clark Glymour.

Edited

Algorithmic learning theory : 11th international conference, ALT 2000 Sydney, Australia, December 11–13, 2000, proceedings. Hiroki Arimura, Sanjay, February 22- Jain, Arun K. Sharma. Berlin: Springer. 2000. . . Computing and combinatorics : 6th annual international conference, DZ Du COCOON 2000, Sydney, Australia, July 26–28, 2000 : proceedings''. D. Du, P. Eades, V. Estivill-Castro, X. Lin, & A. Sharma . Berlin: Springer. 2000. .

Awards

Premier of Queensland Special Award at the 2010 Queensland Export Awards. Included in the Knowledge Nation 100 List, 2015, published by the Office of the Chief Scientist. Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2018 India Australia India Business and Community Awards. Distinguished Alumnus Award from Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani, 2019. Member of the Order of Australia in 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours for services to Computer Science and Information Technology.