Building AI Systems
Worthy of Trust
Rigorous methods for verifying, validating, and optimizing AI in autonomous vehicles, energy systems, and critical infrastructure.
What We Study
When AI systems control vehicles, allocate resources, or guide medical decisions, getting it wrong has real consequences. We build the mathematical tools and validation methods to make sure these systems work as intended.
Safety & Verification
Mathematical frameworks and validation methods that find potential failures in autonomous systems 1000x faster than conventional approaches, enabling safety validation in weeks instead of decades.
Optimization & Decision Making
Algorithms for sequential decision-making under uncertainty, integrating reinforcement learning, Bayesian methods, and mathematical optimization for high-stakes environments.
Sustainability & Supply Chains
AI-powered systems for critical mineral exploration, energy resilience, and equitable clean energy transitions that serve all communities.
Interactive Supply Chain MapAffiliated with IRC Smart Mobility & Logistics and KFUPM-SDAIA Joint Research Center in AI.
Recent News
2026
- Apr 25 New paper out: Knee-xRAI: An Explainable AI Framework for Automatic Kellgren-Lawrence Grading of Knee Osteoarthritis! This work presents a modular, explainable pipeline for radiographic knee OA grading.
- Apr 16 New paper out: Deepbullwhip: An Open-Source Simulation and Benchmarking for Multi-Echelon Bullwhip Analyses! DeepBullwhip is available on PyPI for easy installation. Read more on the blog post.
- Apr 2 Presented a talk on Scalable Verification and Validation for AI Systems at KFUPM. The summary of the talk is available here.
- Mar 10 Excited to be joining both the IRC Smart Mobility and Logistics (IRC-SML) and the KFUPM-SDAIA Joint Research Center in AI (JRC-AI) as a scholar.
- Mar 6 One paper on Optimized Human-Robot Co-Dispatch Planning by a student is accepted for a poster presentation at INCOSE IS 2026 in Japan.
- Mar 3 One paper on validation of decision-making systems for energy transition minerals supply chains is accepted for presentation at ICRS 2026. ArXiv TBA.
- Feb 17 Discussed the “Practical Challenges and Opportunities of Systems Verification and Validation for AI Safety” for ISE Student Club Seminar. Article | Slides
- Jan 5 Our lab is now involved in the teaching team of Engineering Statistics (ISE315). Teaching tools and materials incorporating AI safety and engineering verification and validation problems are available at the ISE 315 course website.
- Jan 2 Congrats to William Xu for publishing AI-Driven Optimization under Uncertainty for Mineral Processing Operations in Sustainable Earth Resources Communications!
- Jan 1 Excited to join the Industrial and Systems Engineering, College of Computing and Mathematics at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM), Saudi Arabia.
Selected Publications
- 2026 Azmul A. Irfan, Nur Ahmad Khatim, Alfan Alfian Irfan, Achmad Zaki, Erike A. Suwarsono, Mansur Arief. “Knee-xRAI: An Explainable AI Framework for Automatic Kellgren-Lawrence Grading of Knee Osteoarthritis.” arXiv preprint. Link
- 2026 Mansur Arief. “Deepbullwhip: An Open-Source Simulation and Benchmarking for Multi-Echelon Bullwhip Analyses.” arXiv preprint. Link
- 2026 Saleh Afroogh, Seyd Ishtiaque Ahmed, Petra Ahrweiler, David Alvarez-Melis, Mansur Arief, Emilia Barakova, Falco J. Bargagli-Stoffi, Erdem Biyik, et al. “Beyond Explainable AI (XAI): An Overdue Paradigm Shift and Post-XAI Research Directions.” arXiv preprint. Link
- 2026 Nur Ahmad Khatim, Mansur Arief. “Optimized Human-Robot Co-Dispatch Planning for Petro-Site Surveillance under Varying Criticalities.” arXiv preprint. Link
- 2025 William Xu, Amir Eskanlou, Mansur Arief, David Zhen Yin, Jef K. Caers. “AI-Driven Optimization under Uncertainty for Mineral Processing Operations.” Sustainable Earth Resources Communications, 1(2): 100-112, 2025. Link