Jo Plested

Dr Jo Plested is an Associate Lecturer in the School of Systems & Computing at UNSW Canberra, University of New South Wales, where she heads the Deep Learning Group. She also holds positions as HDR Program Director and Research Program Coordinator. With ten years of research experience in deep learning, Dr Plested specializes in transfer learning for small, specialised datasets. Her career includes three years lecturing and developing course materials for honours and masters-level courses on Neural Networks, Deep Learning, and Bio-inspired Computing at the Australian National University, serving up to 250 students annually. At UNSW Canberra, she created a new honours-level Deep Learning course and contributed to a Defence short course in data science and artificial intelligence. Dr Plested has supervised over 20 students on Honours, Masters, and Chief of Defence Force projects, mentoring many more through coursework research, with more than 20 of these projects resulting in publications in top international conferences and journals.

Dr Plested has attracted over $900,000 in research funding, serving as chief investigator on five external grants focused on deep learning algorithms and applications. Her collaborative research addresses critical challenges, including bushfire spread prediction with the UNSW Bushfire Research Group, visual swarming for robotics, neural network implementations using physical materials, deep learning for mitigating environmental noise in quantum computing, and assessing ethical implications of AI targeting systems in military contexts. Notable publications include the survey paper 'Deep transfer learning for image classification: a survey' published in Artificial Intelligence Review in 2026 (co-authored with M. Phiri and T. Gedeon), 'Cyber Resilience Limitations in Space Systems Design Process: Insights from Designers' in Systems (2024, with S. Shahzad et al.), 'Information-preserving feature filter for short-term EEG signals' in Neurocomputing (2020, with Y. Yao and T. Gedeon), and conference papers such as 'Rethinking Binary Hyperparameters for Deep Transfer Learning' (2021) and 'Understanding Ethical Implications of AI Enabled Decision Support Systems on the Battlefield' (2024). Her work demonstrates significant impact in advancing AI applications across defence, environmental science, and interdisciplinary fields.

Professional Email: j.plested@adfa.edu.au