Jake Menashe

Contact Information

Jacob Menashe
Department of Computer Science
The University of Texas at Austin
1616 Guadalupe, Suite 2.408
Austin, TX 78701

jmenashe at cs dot utexas dot edu

Jacob Menashe

About Me

I am a fourth-year PhD student in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin. I am interested in machine learning, computer vision, and robotics, and my advisor is Professor Peter Stone. I am a member of the Learning Agents Research Group and the Austin Villa Robot Soccer Team.

I have been a member of the UT Austin Villa robot soccer team since 2012, where I compete in the Standard Platform League. I focus primarily on localization, infrastructure, and the build system, and I also contribute to the vision system, wireless communications, and high level strategy. I helped the team win first place at the US Open in 2012 and 2016, and win the world championship at RoboCup 2012 in Mexico City.

I received my BA in Pure Mathematics from Whitman College in May, 2007. At Whitman I researched semiorders and Riordan numbers under the guidance of my adviser, Professor Barry Balof.

Research

I am interested in model-based hierarchical reinforcement learning and monte-carlo search methods. My goal is to design learning algorithms that allow agents to balance intrinsic and extrinsic rewards in large or infinite environments with complex action dynamics. My current work seeks to do this in the context of an expansive world filled with skills, resources, and adversaries, similar to Ultima Online.

Extras