Research Professor · IIIA-CSIC

Juan A.
Rodríguez-Aguilar

Working at the intersection of multi-agent systems, value-aligned AI, and the application of artificial intelligence for social good.

Email jar@iiia.csic.es
Institute IIIA-CSIC, Bellaterra, Catalonia
Google Scholar DBLP ORCID
Juan A. Rodríguez-Aguilar
01 About

I am a Research Professor at the Artificial Intelligence Research Institute (IIIA) of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), where I conduct research in multi-agent systems, machine learning, and value-aligned artificial intelligence. I am a member of the Multi-Agent Systems department.

I hold a PhD in Artificial Intelligence (2001) and an MSc in Computer Vision (1998) from the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

I am a Fellow of the European Association for Artificial Intelligence (EurAI, 2013), a Member of the ELLIS Society (2024), and a member of the International Foundation for Multiagent Systems board (2024).

02 Research Interests
⚖️

Value-Aligned AI

Designing autonomous agents that reason and act coherently with human values, moral pluralism, and ethical frameworks.

🤝

Multi-Agent Systems

Collective decision-making, coalition formation, and coordination among autonomous agents in complex environments.

🌍

AI for Social Good

Applying AI to education, shared mobility, citizen participation, and sustainable development goals.

03 Selected Recent Publications
2025
Artificial Intelligence · Elsevier
Multi-objective Reinforcement Learning for Provably Incentivising Alignment with Value Systems
M. Rodriguez-Soto, R. Rădulescu, F. Bistaffa, O. Ricart, A. Mayoral-Macau, M. Lopez-Sanchez, J.A. Rodriguez-Aguilar, A. Nowé
2025
Annals of Operations Research · Springer · Vol. 351, pp. 2095–2128
Computing Job-Tailored Degree Plans Towards the Acquisition of Professional Skills
R.X. Lera-Leri, F. Bistaffa, T. Trescak, J.A. Rodríguez-Aguilar
2024
NeurIPS 2024 · 38th Annual Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems
An Analytical Study of Utility Functions in Multi-Objective Reinforcement Learning
M. Rodriguez-Soto, J.A. Rodríguez-Aguilar, M. López-Sánchez
2024
Knowledge-Based Systems · Elsevier · Vol. 287, 111453
Aggregating Value Systems for Decision Support
R. Lera-Leri, E. Liscio, F. Bistaffa, C.M. Jonker, M. López-Sánchez, P.K. Murukannaiah, J.A. Rodríguez-Aguilar, F. Salas-Molina
2024
AAMAS 2024 · 23rd Int. Conf. on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems · Auckland
Value Alignment in Participatory Budgeting
M. Serramia, M. Lopez-Sanchez, J.A. Rodriguez-Aguilar, S. Moretti
2021
IJCAI 2021 · 30th Int. Joint Conf. on Artificial Intelligence
Multi-Objective Reinforcement Learning for Designing Ethical Environments
M. Rodriguez-Soto, M. López-Sánchez, J.A. Rodríguez-Aguilar
04 Projects

Ongoing projects

Principal Investigator · 2024–2026

EMOROBCARE

Emotional Robotics for Healthcare. Developing AI-powered emotional robots for care environments.

Spanish Secretariat for Digitalisation and AI · €906k
Principal Investigator · 2023–2026

ACISUD

Advanced Computational Intelligence for the Sustainable Development Goals.

National · €183k
Contributor · Horizon Europe

VALAWAI

Value-Aware Artificial Intelligence. Embedding human values into autonomous AI systems at scale.

Horizon Europe #101070930 · €3.9M
Contributor · 2024–2028

ALLIES

Artificial inteLLigence In sustainable dEvelopment goalS. Training 17 postdoctoral researchers in AI for SDGs through CSIC's AI Hub collaborative framework.

MSCA COFUND · Horizon Europe #101126626 · €1.62M

All projects

A full list of past and current projects is available on the IIIA-CSIC institutional page.

05 Students

Current PhD Students

Arnau Mayoral
Automated design of learning environments for the learning of value-aligned policies
Co-advised by Manel Rodríguez-Soto
Roger X. Lera-Leri
Explainability for optimisation-based decision support systems
Co-advised by Filippo Bistaffa

Current MSc Students

Antonio Lobo
Value alignment of Generative AI

Former PhD Students

Athina Georgara · PhD 2023
Trustworthy task allocation for human teams
Currently post-doc at University of Southampton
Manel Rodríguez Soto · PhD 2023
Reinforcement learning for value alignment
Currently Research Fellow at IIIA-CSIC · Extraordinary Doctoral Award 2022–23, University of Barcelona
Jordi Ganzer Ripoll · PhD 2022
Collective reasoning on multi-agent debates: A coherent approach
Currently High-school teacher
Marc Serramià Amorós · PhD 2021
Value-aligned norm selection
Currently post-doc at IIIA-CSIC · Best PhD on AI 2022 (ACIA) · BBVA Young Computer Scientists Prize 2023
Ewa Andrejczuk · PhD 2018
AI methods to support people management in organisations
Currently Research Engineer at Google DeepMind, Zurich
Francisco Salas · PhD 2017
Data-driven decision-making and its application to corporate cash management
Currently Associate Professor, Universitat Politècnica de València · Best PhD on Multi-criteria Decision-making 2019 (SEIO)
Javier Morales · PhD 2015
On-line norm synthesis for open multi-agent systems
Currently AI Director at Preply
Marc Pujol-González · PhD 2014
Scaling DCOP algorithms for cooperative multi-agent coordination
Currently CTO at Interficie, Barcelona
Toni Penya-Alba · PhD 2014
Approximate algorithms for decentralised supply chain formation
Currently Senior ML Engineering Manager at Belvo
Meritxell Vinyals · PhD 2011
Exploiting structure in distributed constraint optimisation problems
Currently Permanent Researcher at INRAE, France
Andrés García-Camino · PhD 2008
Normative regulation of open multi-agent systems
Andrea Giovannucci · PhD 2008
Computationally-manageable mixed multi-unit combinatorial auctions
Currently Senior Principal Research Scientist at Bristol Myers Squibb · Runner-up Best PhD on AI 2008 (EurAI)
06 Editorship

Current associate editor

Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems Springer
The Knowledge Engineering Review Cambridge University Press
Studies in the Science of Complex Systems Springer

Former associate editor

Artificial Intelligence Elsevier
Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research (JAIR) AI Access Foundation
Electronic Commerce Research and Applications Elsevier
07 Awards & Distinctions
2024
Member, ELLIS Society
European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems
2022
IJCAI-ECAI Distinguished Senior PC Member Award
For exceptional quality of reviews — also awarded in 2018
2013
Fellow, European Association for Artificial Intelligence (EurAI)
In recognition of outstanding contributions to the field of AI
2005
Elsevier Most Cited Article Award
Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence
2003
Best Agent Application Award
Agentcities International Agent Technology Competition, European Commission
08 Contact

Address

Artificial Intelligence Research Institute (IIIA)
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
Campus UAB, 08193 Cerdanyola
Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
jar@iiia.csic.es