Prof Ruslan Mitkov

Short bio

Prof Dr Ruslan Mitkov is Professor at Lancaster University, one of the top-10 UK universities. Prof Mitkov is also Distinguished Professor at the University of Alicante, Spain. Prior to joining Lancaster University and the University of Alicante, Prof Mitkov worked at the University of Wolverhampton where he created and led the internationally leading Research Group in Computational Linguistics, and was also Director of the Research Institute of Information and Language Processing as well as Director of the Responsible Digital Humanities Lab.

Dr Mitkov has been working in Natural Language Processing (NLP), Computational Linguistics, Corpus Linguistics, Machine Translation, Translation Technology and related areas since the early 1980s. Whereas Prof Mitkov is best known for his seminal contributions to the areas of anaphora resolution, automatic generation of multiple-choice tests and new generation translation memory systems, his extensively cited research (more than 350 publications including 20 books, 40 journal articles and 45 book chapters) also includes but is not limited to topics such as computational phraseology, machine translation, natural language processing for language disabilities, automatic summarisation, computer-aided language processing, corpus annotation, bilingual term extraction, automatic identification of cognates and false friends, NLP-driven corpus-based study of translation universals and text simplification. His recent research includes the employment of Deep Learning, Large Language Models and Artificial Intelligence in Natural Language Processing, Translation Technology, Linguistics and language research in general. Prof Mitkov is not only known for his original research outputs with high scientific impact but also known for his vision and innovative applied research which seeks to enhance the work efficiency of different professions (teachers, translators and interpreters) or seeks to improve the quality of life (people with disabilities).

Prof Mitkov is author of the monograph Anaphora resolution (Longman) and sole Editor of The Oxford Handbook of Computational Linguistics (Oxford University Press) which has been hailed as the most successful Oxford Handbook and whose second, substantially revised edition was published in June 2022. Current prestigious projects include his role as Executive Editor of the journal Natural Language Processing (formerly Journal of Natural Language Engineering) published by Cambridge University Press, Editor-in-Chief of the Natural Language Processing book series of John Benjamins publishers, and Consulting Editor of Oxford University Press publications in Computational Linguistics.

Prof Mitkov has been invited as a keynote speaker at more than 250 international conferences (30 keynote speeches in 2025 only) and is/has been Chair of more than 80 conferences on Natural Language Processing, Translation Technology and Applied Linguistics topics.

He is editor of more than 15 volumes published by Springer and John Benjamins.

Mitkov designed and is director of the first and only Erasmus Mundus Master’s programme in Technology for Translation and Interpreting – an innovative and inspirational programme, with a strong research focus but an equally strong emphasis on business; leading companies in the global translation and language industry participate as associated partners.

Prof Mitkov has been an external examiner of many (more than 60) doctoral theses and curricula in the UK and abroad, including Master’s programmes related to Natural Language Processing, Computational Linguistics, Digital Humanities, Translation and Translation Technology.

Mitkov has led a number of research projects related to Translation Technology and Natural Language Processing funded by the EC, UK and US governmental agencies as well as companies with a total value of more than 25 million euros.

Ruslan Mitkov received his MSc from the Humboldt University in Berlin, his PhD from the Technical University in Dresden and worked as a Research Professor at the Institute of Mathematics, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia. He is a Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Germany, Marie Curie Fellow, Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Franche-Comté in Besançon, France and Distinguished Visiting Researcher at the University of Malaga, Spain.

Ruslan Mitkov is Vice President of AsLing an international Association for promoting Language Technology.

In September 2022 the renowned National Board of Medical Examiners (USA) presented Prof Mitkov with a certificate of distinguished collaboration which resulted in lasting impact on the strategic planning and decision making of the US organisation and their employment of NLP solutions to assessment for the last 17 years.

In recognition of his outstanding professional/research achievements, Prof Mitkov was awarded the title of Doctor Honoris Causa three times.

For additional information, please visit Prof Mitkov’s webpage.

Talk abstract

Natural Language Processing in the Era of Artificial Intelligence: The Wind of Change is Blowing

Natural Language Processing (NLP) is currently undergoing profound and unprecedented transformations. While it has long been acknowledged that NLP technologies are inherently imperfect and far from achieving complete accuracy, recent advancements have significantly reshaped the field of language and translation technologies. First, Deep Learning methods, and now Large Language Models (LLMs), have revolutionised the field and captured widespread attention across both academia and industry.

This entertaining and easy-to-follow talk will shed light on the future of NLP in the era of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The talk will begin by outlining the history of NLP and Machine Translation, reviewing advances driven by Deep Learning and LLMs. The speaker will then provide a critical evaluation of the employment of LLMs in NLP and Machine Translation focusing on his recent comparative studies involving LLMs, traditional Deep Learning architectures, and rule-based methodologies across selected NLP tasks and applications.

Finally, the presentation will conclude with a discussion on the future of NLP. While the speaker does not claim prophetic insight, he will draw on his extensive experience and use linguistic intelligence as a benchmark to offer predictions about how artificial intelligence may evolve relative to human intelligence.