Welcome to Philip Zhao and David Petrescu who have just joined us. Philip has been appointed as Senior Lecturer in the Machine Learning and Robotics group, and David Petrescu as T&S Lecturer.
Prior to joining our department, Philip was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Glasgow. His research focuses on AI-driven cross-system design and optimization for various applications, including robotics, Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS), Internet of Things (IoT), communication networks, and computer vision. His project portfolio reflects a total funding of £3 million. Philip has made significant contributions to academia with over 100 publications, including in prestigious journals such as JSAC, TCOM, TWC, JSTSP, and TSP, as well as top conferences like ICRA, IROS, INFOCOM, ICC, and Globecom. Additionally, Philip holds two patents in the United States.
David studied on our Computer Science (Human-Computer Interaction) programme which then led him on a path of interdisciplinary research using Virtual Reality. He initially investigated low-cost therapy interventions for patients suffering from Phantom Limb Pain. During his PhD David has worked at the intersection of human perception and Computer Graphics investigating how perceptual deficits can be used to optimise the rendering of Virtual Environments.
A very warm welcome to both of you!
A reminder about Bijan’s inaugural Professorial seminar
I do hope to see many of you at Bijan Parsia’s inaugural Professorial research seminar on Wednesday February 28th at 1400 in LT1.3. Bijan will be presenting on "Prosthetic Autonomy". These inaugural Professorial seminars are special occasions where we celebrate colleagues who have achieved the highest level of academic rank. The seminar will have a remote option for those who cannot join in person:
Join Zoom Meeting: https://zoom.us/j/99535716228
Meeting ID: 995 3571 6228, Passcode: 488215
The seminar will be followed by a fancy reception in the common room, so please come and join in!
Meeting with the Innovation Factory and Business Engagement
Please come along to the meeting on Thursday at 1300 in IT407 where we’ll hear from the Innovation Factory and the Business Engagement Team about research commercialisation and impact.
Congratulations to Michael and Alex
I am pleased to announce the election of Alejandro Frangi and the re-election of Michael Fisher to the Executive Committee of the UK Computing Research Committee (UKCRC). It is great to see such good representation from our department: https://www.theiet.org/impact-society/thought-leadership/expert-panels/uk-computing-research-committee-ukcrc/members-of-ukcrc/ukcrc-executive-committee/
The S3 research group are improving one of the world's most important software infrastructure
Last September the S3 research group in our department started a collaborative project with the Ethereum Foundation (EF) to test and verify the Ethereum Consensus Specifications. In particular, the group extended their software model checker ESBMC (https://github.com/esbmc/esbmc) to formally verify Python code, which is the language used by EF to write the consensus specification designed to improve scalability, security, and sustainability of the Ethereum network. Ethereum is a decentralized global software platform powered by blockchain technology. It is most commonly known for its native cryptocurrency, ether (ETH). Two weeks ago EF confirmed the existence of the bug that the S3 group found in one of the components of the Ethereum Consensus Specifications with the ESBMC tool.
Congratulations to Lucas Cordeiro and the ESBMC team, particularly Bruno Farias, who is extending ESBMC to check Python programs, and to Youcheng Sun for leading this project within the S3 group. This is a great example of research with impact.
Andrew
Ruth Maddocks
Sarah Millington
Sarah Chatwin