Profile

Photo:

David Leslie

    • About Me:

      I live near Lancaster with my wife, three kids and two cats. I am a mathematician, specialising in statistics and artificial intelligence, during the day. Outside of work I play trumpet and go cycling.

    • Read more

      I work at Lancaster University in the maths department. While I do some lecturing each year, and supervise some PhD students, a major component of my work is research into statistics and artificial intelligence. This expertise is in high demand, so I spend a lot of my time working with companies and government departments helping them to work out how to solve problems. I really enjoy this puzzle-solving aspect of what I do.

      It is a big stress relief for me when I get my trumpet out and go and play in the jazz band. It is old-fashioned music, but I enjoy it; my children don’t, when I drag them along to listen.

      My other passion is cycling. I ride my bike to get around and also for sport. And I coach at the local youth cycling club. In earlier parts of my life I have been a diver and a rugby player, but neither are sports that you can keep doing as you get older unfortunately.

    • My pronouns are:

      he/him

    • How I use Maths in my work:

      I am a Professor of Statistical Learning, which means I am a senior member of my university department. My expertise is decision mathematics and statistics. I teach undergraduate students advanced probability theory. I use tools of probability and statistics to develop artificial intelligence systems to solve problems that matter to various companies. For example, supermarkets might want to know when and by how much to discount goods to ensure that they are sold before their expiry date, and have worked with us to develop a method to experiment with different prices without losing too much profit while doing so. Some of my work has been funded by and used by Google to decide which adverts to display on web pages.

    • My Work:

      I am a researcher that develops computer algorithms that learn how to improve their performance by observing and acting in their environment

    • Read more

      Maths is at the core of artificial intelligence. All new methods are developed using  mathematical tools. How to adapt the system to improve performance: calculus. How to experiment appropriately to gather more information, and how to process it: statistics. How to prove that something will work: probability.

      I use the set of things I have learned in my mathematical career to develop new methods for machine learning. I either do this just for the fun of it, or because a company has asked us to provide a tool.

      I also teach undergraduate students, mainly in lectures, and postgraduate students in project work.

      Because I’ve being doing this for a while, I often get asked to advise companies and government on how best to use AI and machine learning to improve their performance.

    • My Typical Day:

      There’s no such thing as a typical day in my job

    • Read more

      Sometimes I work essentially a 9-5 day and teach students.

      Other days I take a trip to London to advise government.

      Others I might be at an international conference presenting my research and hearing what other people are up to.

      Others I might be working with a company, trying to work out how to use maths to solve their problems.

    • What I'd do with the prize money:

      I would pay my PhD students to develop some really good materials for wide dissemination, explaining the importance of maths in the AI revolution

    CV

    • Education:

      I grew up in Edinburgh and went to Boroughmuir High School (the local state school). I played lots of music, both classical and in a band that played in the pubs of Edinburgh. I also represented Scotland at springboard and highboard diving.

      I went to Cambridge University to study maths, and they bulldozed the diving pool, so I switched to playing rugby. I still played lots of music, in the many classical orchestras, in musicals, and in a couple of function bands.

      After Cambridge, I did a PhD in Bristol, then lectured at Oxford, then took a job in Sydney (Australia) for a couple of years, before returning to Bristol again as a lecturer. I moved to Lancaster about 11 years ago. Since I started my PhD I have published several papers each year on aspects of mathematics, statistics, game theory, and artificial intelligence. I engage regularly with a variety of different companies and government departments to help them to develop solutions.

      More recently I have been dragged into management, and was Head of the Statistics Section at Lancaster University, but have now escaped back to being a researcher and consultant in mathematical AI.

    • Qualifications:

      I did Scottish exams that have all changed names since. I translate to current-ish (English) grade names.

      • Standard grades (GCSE-equivalent): English, Maths, French, Geography, Physics, Chemistry, Computing, all grade 1 (the top grade)
      • Highers (AS-level-equivalent): English, Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Computing, all grade A
      • Certificate of Sixth Year Studies (A-level-equivalent): General Maths, Pure Maths, Applied Maths, Physics, all grade A
      • BA Mathematics, Cambridge University, 1st class
      • Certificate of Advanced Studies in Mathematics, Cambridge University (essentially a Masters, aka “Part 3”) Distinction
      • PhD in Mathematics, University of Bristol

      Grade 8 violin, Grade 7 Trumpet

      First aid certificate

      200m front crawl

    • Work History:

      1992-1995: Busker on the streets of Edinburgh (much more lucrative than cafe work!)

      1995: Library assistant, Edinburgh city libraries

      1996: Barman, potato picker

      1997: Intern at Royal Bank of Scotland in IT

      1998: Intern at Goldman Sachs

      2003-2004: Lecturer, Oxford University

      2004-2006: Researcher, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

      2006-2014: Lecturer, then Senior Lecturer, University of Bristol

      2014-2026: Professor, Lancaster University

      2018-2020: Consultant, Prowler.io (an AI startup in Cambridge)

    • Current Job:

      Professor of Statistical Learning

    • Employer:

      Lancaster University

    • My Interview

      • How would you describe yourself in 3 words?

        mathematician, cyclist, trumpeter

        What did you want to be after you left school?

        happy

        Were you ever in trouble at school?

        Only when we performed the song "Killing in the Name Of" at the school concert

        If you weren't doing this job, what would you choose instead?

        Musician

        Who is your favourite singer or band?

        Amy Winehouse. English Teacher. Red Hot Chili Peppers.

        What's your favourite food?

        Noodles

        If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!

        I would want days to be 30 hours so I can do more stuff. I want my children to do well at school without too much stress. I want Trump and Putin and Xi to shuffle on and let the world live in peace

        Tell us a joke.

        How do you tell the extrovert mathematicians? They look at the other people's feet! (It's a dreadful stereotype of course, but I think signifies that I work in a community where we are happy to accept those that do not conform to society's expectations of how to interact with others.)

Questions answered by David

No questions to show