ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to thank my advisor and thesis chair, Andrew McCallum. It would not be an exaggeration to say that he has been best advisor I could hope for. His infectious optimism seemingly in the face of all evidence to the contrary has helped me through numerous rough patches, whether it was during the moments of self-doubt that every graduate student faces, or when I was ready to reject ideas based on early negative results. To me, Andrew is a role model for many different aspects of being an academician, including how to be an effective researcher, how to be a skillful hacker and a software engineer, understanding the importance of methods that are both practical and principled1, how to still be an involved family man while being a successful academic, how to write papers that are precise and a pleasure to read, and so on. My evolution from a confused first-year to a focused researcher would not have been possible without Andrew’s guidance. I am also extremely grateful to the other advisors I have had over the years, especially my dissertation committee. Apart from providing valuable technical feedback on early versions of this work, Ben Marlin helped me with my first grant-writing experience, patiently stepping through the sections and providing suggestions on the many versions. David Jensen’s insights on empirica