Javen Shi

Also known as Javen Qinfeng Shi, Qinfeng Shi

Javen Shi is a causal AI researcher whose work covers the discovery of latent variables, generalisation under distribution shifts and the modelling of intervention outcomes. He studied at Northwestern Polytechnical University in Xi'an, did his PhD at the Australian National University from 2006 to 2010, and was first author of "Hash Kernels for Structured Data" in the Journal of Machine Learning Research in 2009. At the University of Adelaide he moved from senior research associate in 2010 to professor in 2020, and his team took first place in the Open Catalyst Challenge at NeurIPS in 2023. In 2025, he received the ACM SIGIR Test of Time Award for a 2015 paper on image-based recommendations and became Interim Director of the Responsible AI Research Centre. He is a professor at Adelaide University, Director of the Causal AI Group and Director of Advanced Reasoning and Learning at the Australian Institute for Machine Learning.

Now at: Responsible AI Research Centre, Causal AI Group and Australian Institute for Machine Learning

Timeline

1999–2010

A Canberra PhD and hash kernels

He studies at Northwestern Polytechnical University in Xi'an, China, from 1999 to 2006 for a bachelor's and a master's degree, then does his PhD at the Australian National University in Canberra from 2006 to 2010. In 2009, he is first author of "Hash Kernels for Structured Data" in the Journal of Machine Learning Research, written with John Langford, Alex Smola and three other coauthors; the paper proposes hashing to make kernels efficient.
2010–2020

From research associate to professor

He joins the University of Adelaide as a senior research associate in 2010, receives the ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award in 2012, and holds an ARC DECRA fellowship from 2012 to 2014. He is a senior lecturer from 2015, an associate professor from 2018 and a professor from 2020.
2019–2020

Explorer Challenge and Volkswagen prize

In 2019, he places second in the global OZ Minerals Explorer Challenge, among more than 1,000 participants from 62 countries, and wins the Volkswagen Golden Prize for AI-powered digital factory innovation. He wins the AUS/NZ Bushfire Data Quest in 2020.
2023

Open Catalyst Challenge win

In 2023, he is on the team, with Xinyu Li, Zhen Zhang and Anton van den Hengel, that takes first place in the Open Catalyst Challenge for AI-driven materials discovery at NeurIPS.
February 2025

Interim director of RAIR

In February 2025, he is appointed Interim Director of the Responsible AI Research (RAIR) Centre.
2025

A SIGIR Test of Time Award

In 2025, he receives the ACM SIGIR Test of Time Award for "Image-based recommendations on styles and substitutes", a SIGIR 2015 paper written with Julian McAuley, Christopher Targett and Anton van den Hengel. The paper treats visual relationships between objects as a network inference problem on graphs of related images and provides a large-scale dataset.
2025–2026

Papers on latent causal models

In 2025, Transactions on Machine Learning Research publishes "Latent Covariate Shift: Unlocking Partial Identifiability for Multi-Source Domain Adaptation", which shows that a latent content variable can be identified up to block identifiability. In 2026, the Journal of Machine Learning Research publishes "Identifying Weight-Variant Latent Causal Models". He coauthors both papers with Yuhang Liu and six other authors.
As of October 2026

Director of the Causal AI Group

He is a professor at Adelaide University, Director of the Causal AI Group, Interim Director of the Responsible AI Research Centre and Director of Advanced Reasoning and Learning at the Australian Institute for Machine Learning. His causal AI methods identify root causes, discover latent variables, improve generalisation under distribution shifts and model the consequences of interventions. He has also written three books: Be Cause: You Are the Cause! and Seven Wisdoms for Success, published in 2025, and What the Soul Wants, published in 2026.

Career

Since 2025Responsible AI Research CentreInterim Director
NowAdelaide UniversityProfessor
NowCausal AI GroupDirector
NowAustralian Institute for Machine LearningDirector of Advanced Reasoning and Learning
2010–2014University of AdelaideSenior research associate, Senior lecturer