Anne Cregan
Senior Researcher
Kensington Research Laboratory, Sydney
Anne Cregan graduated from the University of Sydney with a First Class Honours Science Degree. After second year, she decided not to be a theoretical physicist and instead majored in Mathematical Statistics and gained first class Honours in Psychology. She achieved the equal top Honours mark for her year. Her Honours year work focussed on Cognitive Psychology, Human Intelligence and Psychometric Methods. Her degree work over 1985-1989 also encompassed Pure and Applied Maths, Physics, PsychoLinguistics, History and Philosophy of Science, Traditional and Modern Philosophy, Computer Science and Chemistry.
At 22, Anne then commenced a commercial career including:
- Programmer and Information Analyst at Qantek (1990-1993)
- Planning and Scheduling Analyst at Qantas Airways (1993-1996)
- Predictive Marketing Models Manager at St George Bank (1996-1998)
- General Manager of Dot Communications Ltd (Internet Company) (1998-2000)
- General Manager of MailTV Ltd (Internet Company) (1999 - 2000)
- Business and IT consultant, self-employed and Ajilon (1998-2003). Clients including Telstra, Westpac, Pacific Access, NICTA (assisting Arun Sharma with initial setup phase).
- Contract Program Manager overseeing all projects at Quoin (IT/Web/ Multimedia company) (2002).
In 2003 Anne commenced a PhD focussing on Ontologies, Semantic Technologies and the Semantic Web. Anne's papers and academic work are available at www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~annec
Research work encompasses an interoperability solution for OWL (Web Ontology Language) with Topic Maps, an analysis for a new approach to concept definition, a consideration of Semantic Interoperability issues tracing back to the Symbol Grounding Problem and strategies for resolving it for the Semantic Web, fundamental issues in representing meaning, and an English-like syntax for OWL ("Sydney OWL SYNTAX").
During her PhD candidature Anne has been involved in several NICTA projects and in 2006 she contributed to the Semantic Technology Forum and Workshop held by NICTA to encourage the use of Semantic Technologies in Industry and Government. Anne is currently involved with various Standards Bodies (W3C, ISO, Standards Australia) contributing to the development of International and Australian Semantic Standards.
Anne will shortly finish her PhD and then plans to devote her energies to practical implementations of Semantic Technologies.