Chris Mattmann (born October 29, 1980) is an American data scientist and artificial intelligence leader serving as the Chief Data and Artificial Intelligence Officer at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), a position he assumed in June 2024. He is the first Chief Data and AI Officer in the University of California system and chairs the UC Systemwide AI Council Innovation and Impact Sub-Committee. Previously, Mattmann spent 24 years (2001-2024) at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where he served as Principal Data Scientist, Chief Technology and Innovation Officer, and Division Manager of the Artificial Intelligence, Analytics and Innovative Development Organization.
Mattmann graduated from the University of Southern California (USC) in 2007 with a PhD in Computer Science studying with Dr. Nenad Medvidović and he went on to invent Apache Tika with Jérôme Charron. Apache Tika is a widely used software framework for content detection and analysis. Mattmann later wrote a book about the framework titled Tika in Action[1] with Jukka Zitting, which is published by Manning Publications.
Chris Mattmann's work on Tika and other projects was heavily influenced by open source both at NASA and within the academic community. After creating Tika, and helping to create other projects including Apache Nutch (an open source web crawler and the predecessor to the big data platform Apache Hadoop), Mattmann joined the Board of Directors at the Apache Software Foundation in May 2013. He served on the board until March 2018, holding roles including Treasurer, Vice Chairman, and Vice President of the Legal Affairs Committee.
During this time, Chris worked to apply open source principles to data management problems inspired by his work at NASA in Earth and Planetary science, and in engineering. Mattmann maintained an affiliation with USC as an Adjunct Associate Professor and in order to continue to do research on open source and data management, he created the Information Retrieval and Data Science Group (IRDS).[2] IRDS includes diverse students in the areas of data science, information retrieval and informatics and the group exists within USC's Viterbi School of Engineering.[3] The focus of the group is on cross disciplinary data and content analysis work applied to the science, business, engineering and information technology (IT) domains.
Career
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (2001-2024)
Mattmann spent 23 years at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where he held multiple leadership positions. His work focused on data science, information retrieval, and software architecture for space missions. His final roles at JPL included Principal Data Scientist (JPL's first in this designation), Chief Technology and Innovation Officer, and Division Manager of the Artificial Intelligence, Analytics and Innovative Development Organization from 2020 to 2024.
At NASA, Mattmann's work was applied to numerous space missions including Orbiting Carbon Observatory 1/2, NPP Sounder PEATE, and the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) Earth science missions. He was one of the principal developers of the Object Oriented Data Technology platform, an open source data management system framework originally developed by NASA JPL and then donated to the Apache Software Foundation.
From 2015 to 2018, Mattmann led research teams working with DARPA and NASA JPL on the Memex project, which involved data discovery and dissemination from the Deep Web and Dark Web.
UCLA (2024-present)
In June 2024, Mattmann joined UCLA as its inaugural[4] Chief Data and Artificial Intelligence Officer,[5] the first such position in the University of California system and one of only a few at universities nationwide. He reports to Lucy Avetisyan, UCLA's Associate Vice Chancellor and Chief Information Officer. In this role, Mattmann develops and implements UCLA's strategic roadmap for data and AI innovations, establishes governance frameworks for ethical AI deployment, and fosters campus-wide collaboration around AI tools.
Mattmann chairs the UC Systemwide AI Council Innovation and Impact Sub-Committee, extending his influence across all UC campuses. In September 2024, he negotiated UCLA's agreement with OpenAI, making UCLA the first California university to incorporate this technology at institutional scale.
He also holds a secondary appointment as Associate Project Scientist at UCLA's Joint Institute for Regional Earth System Science & Engineering (JIFRESSE).
University of Southern California (2007-2025)
Mattmann left his position as Adjunct Research Professor and Director of the Information Retrieval & Data Science (IRDS) Group at USC's Viterbi School of Engineering in May 2025, a role he had held since creating the group. He taught graduate courses including CSCI 572 (Information Retrieval and Web Search Engines) and Content Detection & Analysis.
Recent Work and Recognition (2020-2025)
Mattmann published "Machine Learning with TensorFlow, Second Edition" [6] through Manning Publications in 2021, a comprehensive guide covering advanced topics including VGG-Face facial identification, deep speech classifiers, sentiment analysis, and image recognition.
His recent research includes work on improving spatial resolution of satellite wind speed through super-resolution (IEEE Access, 2023), many-to-English machine translation tools (ACL 2021), and technology readiness levels for machine learning systems (2021).
From 2021 to 2023, Mattmann organized and ran AI Bootcamps in Pasadena in partnership with the Mark Cuban Foundation, serving as guest MC and mentor.
Mattmann has been featured in over 124 media articles from outlets including ABC, NBC, WIRED, The New York Times, and Quanta Magazine, and delivers keynote addresses on topics including AI regulation, AI in entertainment, and combating election disinformation.
References
↑ 1 Chris A. Mattmann, 2 Jukka L. Zitting (December 2011). Tika in Action. Manning. ISBN9781935182856.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
↑ Mattmann, Chris A.; Penberthy, Scott (2020). Machine Learning with TensorFlow (Seconded.). Shelter Island, NY: Manning Publications Co. ISBN978-1-61729-771-7.
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