Department of CS newsletter

Welcome back  and a happier New Year. I hope  you managed to have some kind of break. There is a lot going on at the moment, especially around  the consequences of the current lock down.  These consequences do change, so do keep up via various School meetings etc. The general message is, however, stay at home if at all possible.

One bit of good news as the New Year starts is that  we should be able to participate in Horizon europe, the successor to H2020, see

https://www.staffnet.manchester.ac.uk/news/display/?id=25580

Robert.

I welcome the following four people who have joined  the Department as three year fixed term Teaching Focused academics.

Ainur Begalinova 

Ainur joined our department as an undergraduate student in 2010, and recently completed her PhD in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence also in the department. Her research interests include Robotic Grasping and Manipulation, and Sensor Fusion. In 2019-2020 she worked as a postdoc with Dr. Riza Batista-Navarro, in 2020 as a Lecturer in Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. 

Joe Razavi

Joe has been around since 2008 when he joined the department as an undergraduate student. His PhD with Andrea Schalk was on the theory of computation. They continue to collaborate, applying category theory to the foundations of computer science. Until last year he was a postdoc working on the INSPEX H2020 project with Richard Banach, providing formal correctness and power modelling for a prototype embedded sensor system. Joe's interests are in programming languages and mathematical models of computation. 

Viktor Schlegel

Hi everyone, I am Viktor, one of the new teaching focussed Lecturers in the Department. You may, however, have seen me already either in the hallways in Kilburn, because I did my PhD here at Manchester, or when I was trying to convince you to take part in the PGR socials, because during my PhD I was also a mentor. I did my undergraduate and master’s studies in Passau, a small city in Germany, bordering Austria and the Czech Republic. In any case, I anticipate with joy the start my professional academic career at the University of Manchester in the Computer Science Department. I look forward to working together and delivering high quality university experience for our students even during these challenging times.

Nikolaos Konstantinou 

Nikolaos (Nikos) Konstantinou is a teaching focused lecturer at the University of Manchester, Department of Computer Science. He is also a co-founder and director at The Data Value Factory, helping data users obtain insights from data. Between 2015 and 2020 he was a research fellow at the University of Manchester. Before that, he held a variety of technical management and research roles in Greece. His PhD (2010) and BSc (2004) are from the National Technical University of Athens, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He is a member of the Technical Chamber of Greece and a senior member of the IEEE.

We are also joined by Alex Creswell, who is taking up a Chair at Manchester for one day a week. Alex will have a role across the university in boosting impact activities. Do expect to see Alex, both virtually and for real when the time comes, as he visits people to talk commercialisation and getting the fruits of  our work out there into the world.

Alex retired from British government service at the end of 2020 after 27 years in a variety of National Security roles, often including a technology angle. He has led a division of GCHQ and has served in the Cabinet Office, directing the team of analysts (JIO) which provides the British Prime Minister’s daily intelligence briefing. From 2017, Alex was Head of Cyber and Technology in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, working with the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) to provide an important element of the UK’s operational defence against cyber threats. In addition to his new role at Manchester University, Alex will be working with early stage companies in the US and Europe. He also advises Graphcore, an AI startup. Alex is a keen trail runner. His running logbook includes the Soweto marathon, the Hadrian’s Wall ultra marathon and runs across the Pyrenees.
 

You may have already received this through a different channel, but if not, please find below information on hiring a UoM student intern over summer 2021 for a paid internship. Please feel free to share this information to wider colleagues at the university.

Proposals are now being accepted for the Learning Through Research Internships programme for 2021. Thanks to a merged endowment there is funding to pay the students for a six week internship period during summer 2021. Students will also be supported through a weekly development programme of workshops organized by the Careers Service.

Designed for all undergraduates (except those in their final year), the objective of the Learning Through Research Internships is to provide students with an insight into the work of academic researchers plus an informed understanding of some of the key issues shaping contemporary research.

To be considered for funding the please submit your proposals by Sunday 7^th February 2020 – to apply please contact Lewis Howells via lewis.howells-2@manchester.ac.uk for further details and a Learning Through Research Internship template for completion.

For further details please see: https://www.manchester.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/teaching-learning/methods-materials/research/

N.B. Where possible, internship proposals should have the contingency to be delivered/adapted to be delivered remotely if campus access is limited during Summer 2021.

Careers Service Team

Student Mental Health Helpline

Student Support | Taking care of your wellbeing | 24 hour mental health helpline | The University of Manchester

Staff Mental Health Helpline

Health Assured | Staff wellbeing | StaffNet | The University of Manchester

Join here: https://zoom.us/j/99778499470

Speaker: Lee Smith, co-founder of Arm and current Arm Fellow, IP working group

Host: Susan Embury

Title: Open source - 19th C. capitalism re-invented?

Bio: Lee Smith, Arm Fellow

Lee is a Cambridge maths graduate who wandered his way to Arm via the Scientific Civil Service, five years as a Computer Science academic at University of Edinburgh, and seven years at Acorn Computers. Lee's technical background is in EDA tools (especially system modelling and simulation), then compilers, then computer architecture, and most recently where architecture meets security (including being active in Arm's Morello project, part of UKRI's Digital Security by Design initiative). These days Lee works 4 days per week and spends half his time working with Arm's Legal and People teams.

Abstract:

Today, 80% of open-source software development is funded by for-profit businesses. Have you ever wondered why?

In this light-hearted tour, I'll survey how and why we got to this and why business might find open source software (OSS) profitable.

If time permits, I'll conclude with some speculations about open source hardware (OSH) and point out some reasons why OSH might, and might not, follow OSS trends.

The diversity calendar | Equality, Diversity and Inclusion | StaffNet | The University of Manchester