EDUCATION
PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 2002-2007, GPA: 4.9/5 Area: Interactive Conversational Robots & Language Grounding
MS, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), 1999-2000, GPA: 3.97/4 Area: Control, Signal Processing, Computer Vision
MEng (5-Yr Eng. Diploma), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 1993-1999, Cum Laude Electrical & Computer Engineering, Specialization: Computers & Electronics
In parallel but totally independent to my Engineering Diploma, I also took: B. Sc., The UK Open University, 1993-1998, First Class Honors (Cum Laude) Major: Pure & Applied Mathematics, Minor: Music Theory, Harmony & History
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Founder and Director, Interactive Robots and Media Lab, and Ass. Professor of Intelligent Systems, CIT, United Arab Emirates University, 2007
Research Asst., MIT Media Lab, Affective Computing &Cognitive Machines, 2002-2007 Areas: Interactive Robots and Language, Vision & face recognition, Activity Det. & Rec.
Researcher, Informatics & Telematics Institute (ITI), Greece, 2000-2001 Area: EU HiScore Project: Face & Gesture Rec. using novel 3D cameras
Design Engineer, CPERI/FORTH, Greece, 1999-2000 Area: Designed HW/SW, built, wrote basic OS for Perseus, a meas./control computer 2. Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activities
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
(>150 citations in total so far):
N. Mavridis N., E. Machado et al.,"Real-time Teleoperation of an Industrial Robotic Arm Through Human Arm Movement Imitation", IRIS 2010
C. Christoforou, N. Mavridis et al.,"Android tele-operation through Brain-Computer Interfacing: A real-world demo with non-expert users", IRIS 2010
N. Mavridis, M. Petychakis et al., "FaceBots: Shared Memories and Shared Friends towards meaningful long-term HRI", CogSys 2010
N. Mavridis, "Robot Friends: Artificial Agents entering Human Social Networks", in book "The Networked Self: Identity, Community and Culture on Social Network Sites", Routledge, New York, 2010
N. Mavridis, W. Kazmi and P. Toulis, "Friends with Faces: How Social Networks Can Enhance Face Recognition and Vice Versa", in book "Computational Social Networks Analysis: Trends, Tools and Research Advances", Springer Verlag, 2009
N. Mavridis, A. Rashdi, M. Ketbi, S. Ketbi, A. Marar, "Exploring Behaviors & Collaborative Mapping through Mindstorms Robots: A case study in applied constructionism at senior-project level", IEEE Innov.2009
N. Mavridis and D. Hanson, "The IbnSina Center: An Augmented Reality Theater with Intelligent Robotic and Virtual Characters", IEEE RoMAN09
N. Mavridis, W. Kazmi, P. Toulis, C. Ben-AbdelKader, "On the synergies between online social networking, Face Recognition, and Interactive Robotics", CaSoN 2009
N. Mavridis, "Approaches towards Natural Language Communication for Interactive Robots", ICRA 2009 cognitive factors
N. Mavridis, C. Datta et al, "Facebots: Social robots utilizing and publishing social information in Facebook", IEEE HRI 2009
N. Mavridis, S. Emami et al.: "Facebots: Embodied Conversational Social Robots", TEE Robotics Conference 2009
V. Kwee, N. Mavridis, H. Tair, A. Shehi, A. Yammahi, S. Maqdahi, "Digital Extensions to Cultural Objects", DMACH 2008
D. Roy, R. Patel, P. DeCamp, R. Kubat, M. Fleischman, B. Roy, N. Mavridis, S. Tellex, A. Salata, J. Guinness, M. Levit, P. Gorniak: "The Human Speechome Project", Annual Cognitive Science Conference 2006
N. Mavridis, D. Roy, "Grounded Situation Models for Robots: Where words and percepts meet", IEEE IROS 2006 (>30 citations so far)
N. Mavridis, D. Roy, "Grounded Situation Models for Robots: Bridging Language, Perception, and Action", AAAI-05 modular construction of human-like intelligence
D. Roy, K. Hsiao and N. Mavridis, "Mental Imagery for a Conversational Robot", IEEE Systems, Man & Cybernetics Part B, 2004
K. Hsiao, N. Mavridis and D. Roy, "Coupling Perception and Simulation: Steps Towards Conversational Robotics", IEEE IROS’2003 conference
D. Roy, K. Hsiao and N. Mavridis, "Conversational Robots: Building Blocks for Grounding Word Meanings", NAACL HLT’2003 conference
S. Malasiotis et al., "A face and gesture recognition system based on an active stereo sensor", IEEE ICIP 2001 Conf. Proc.
N. Mavridis et al., "The HISCORE face recognition application: Affordable desktop face recognition based on a novel 3D camera", EURASIP ICAV3D 2001 Conference
MONOGRAPHS, REPORTS, AND EXTENSION PUBLICATIONS
MIT Media Lab Technical Reports: "Pathways towards human action and the proposal of the Human Activity Language", "Costraints for cross-species intention recognition and feeling / desire communication" etc.
Extensive internal evaluation report for Siemens as part of the EU HiScore project regarding performance evaluation of various 2D/3D face recognition methods
INVITED TALKS
AUEB - Athens University of Economics and Business – 2005
AUS – American University of Sharjah – Nov. 2005
AUD – American University of Dubai – Nov. 2005
Tehran University – Aug. 2006
Beijing Academy of Sciences, Control & Automation Lab – Oct. 2006
National Technical University of Taiwan – Oct. 2006
ITRI – Industrial Technology Research Institute, Taiwan – Oct. 2006
Osaka University, Japan – Oct. 2006
Waseda University, Japan – Oct. 2006
WPI – Worcester Polytechnic Institute – Mar. 2007
ND – Notre Dame University – Apr. 2007
UIUC – University of Illinois Urbana – Champaign, Apr. 2007
UGuelph – Univesity of Guelph, May 2007
UToronto – University of Toronto, May 2007
McMaster University, May 2007
Cyprus National University, May 2007
NYU, New York University Abu Dhabi, Dec 2008
NTUA - National Technical University of Athens, May 2009
ACT – American College of Thessaloniki, May 2009
SEERC – South-East European Research Center, May 2009
HAISS – Hellenic Artificial Intelligence Summer School, Aug 2009
CMU - Carnegie Mellon University Qatar, Oct 2009
KUSTAR - Khalifa University of Science and Technology, Dec 2009
FILMS, CD's, VIDEOS, WEBSITES etc.
Referee-Accepted Videos for video sessions of international conferences:
Grounded Situation Models: Where Words and Percepts Meet, IROS 2006
FaceBots: Social Robots Utilizing FaceBook, HRI 2009
The IbnSina Interactive Theater: Where Humans, Robots and Virtual Characters Meet, RO-MAN 2009
Youtube Research-related videos: More than 10 orginal videos of our projects, >30Kviews, youtube channel irmluaeu
Websites:
Interactive Robots and Media Lab site, http://irml.uaeu.ac.ae >20Khits 2008-9
GCC Cognitive Science Society site, http://www.hafeet.uaeu.ac.ae/irmlcogsci/
Literary Scripts / Fiction: "The Dream of IbnSina": A poetic semi-fictional autobiographical monologue regarding the life and dreams of the famous 11-th century polymath (Avicenna), in the form of an imaginary letter to Plato. Script partially utilized towards character-based animation demonstration of the IbnSina theatre.
Publicity / popular science: Articles, documentaries, TV news clips, and news items about my work in media of more than 20 countries worldwide. A listing follows later in this document
EXHIBITS, PERFORMANCES, DEMONSTRATION etc.
GETEX 2008 Gulf Education and Training Exhibition, Dubai: IRML Robots Demonstratations
UAEU 2009 Student Recruitment Event in Abu Dhabi and Dubai: IRML Robots Demonstrations
IDEX 2009 International Defense Exhibition, Abu Dhabi: IRML RoboGuard and other robot Demonstrations, Numerous top worldwide military commanders sign in
Researcher’s Night, Research Promotion Institute, Government of Cyprus First public participation demo of Brain-Computer-Interfacing driving a remote humanoid’s movements (Ibn Sina, in IRML lab in UAE)
GITEX 2009 Gulf Information Technology Exhibition, Dubai: IbnSina robot demonstrations, with Acapela Tech
>100 demos of IRML lab and robots between 2008-09 to VIP guests: ministers (education of Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Brunei etc.), ambassadors (Canada etc.), research lab and research agency directors (including NSF etc.), university presidents and deans (Berkeley, KTH etc.).
h. Original Designs, Plans, Inventions, Software, and/or Patents. Patents: Social Context for FaceRec pending, and more in prep. Software: Vision Module for FaceBots soon to be open sourced soon, (Grounded Situation Model suite planned for later).
i. Contracts and Grants.
Microsoft External Research USA seed funds from HRI CFP, $50000 UAEU Research Affairs Interdisc. Grant for Cognitive Science Society Activities, approved by external reviewers, under final modifications, AED 200000 Applied to UAE National Research Foundation, which is still non-functional. j. Fellowships, Prizes, and Awards Given for Research or Teaching Achievements IKY Greek State Scholarship, 1998-1999 Rockwell-funded University Fellowship, 1999-2000 Onassis Foundation Honorary Scholarship, 2002-2003 Microsoft-award funds for FaceBots research project, 2008-2009
k. Editorships, Editorial Boards, and Reviewing Activities for Journals and Other Learned Publications. Reviewer for: IEEE Systems, Man and Cybernetics, ICVW, AITEM, IEEE Innovations in IT, ICVS etc. l. Other. Conceived of, designed, founded, and directing the Interactive Robots and Media Laboratory (IRML) of the United Arab Emirates University, the first such lab of its regions, which is engaged in two major world-class projects and has received unsurpassed (for a UAEU lab) international public attention so far. As director, have been responsible for: public relations (frequent visitor demos, exhibitions, press relations, leaflets and website), recruitment, fundraising, finances, project management, strategy, vision and multiple other such aspects. The two current main projects of IRML are: "FaceBots", the Microsoft-award funding recipient (one of 8 of 74 proj. funded, alongside MIT, Yale etc.) world’s first robots that utilize&publish FaceBook info, "IbnSina", the world’s first Arabic speaking and comprehending android, within a unique interactive theatre which allows multiple forms of teleparticipation. IRML Summer School: The IRML is also hosting an annual international project-centered Summer School, with one month duration, and participation of UAE national as well as international students from renowned universities such as MIT, Cambridge, as well as from all over the world – Brazil, Spain, Yugoslavia, Pakistan, India. Content, lectures, and projects can be found at the IRML website 3. Teaching, Mentoring, and Advisinga. Courses taught in the last five years.
(UAEU, Often more than one section per semester: ) CSBP480/CSBP301 Artificial Intelligence Spring 09, Fall 09 ITBP219 Object-Oriented Programming Spring 08, Fall 08, Fall 09 ITBP320 Data Structures and Algorithms Summer 08 CSBP470 / ITBP315 Operating Systems Summer 08, Fall 08, Spring 08 MATH100 Computers and Scientific Apps Fall 07 ITBP290 IT Core Project Fall 08 ITBP490 Senior Project Spring 08, Spring 09 In total, taught 16 sections in the last two academic years. Peer and student evaluation reviews excellent; see annual reports and files. Guest Lectures at MIT: MAS622 Pattern Recognition and Analysis (MIT, 2007) b. Course or Curriculum Development. Course content and curriculum development for course: CSBP301 Artificial Intelligence. Totally new curriculum, including basics of history of AI, software agents, pattern recognition, vision, speech and language tech, robotics, and other topics, to act as the core Intelligent Systems track course. Multimedia presentation and lab material developed, using JNNS, OpenCV, Matlab etc.
c. Manuals, Notes, Software, Webpages, and Other Contributions to Teaching.
Multimedia presentation and lab material developed, using JNNS, OpenCV, Matlab etc. Special software created for basic game-playing agents, and illustration of evolutionary algorithms for such agents in Matlab.
d. Teaching Awards and Other Special Recognition. Excellent peer and student evaluation reports. e. Advising: Other Than Supervising Student Research.i. Undergraduate.
- Advising circa 20 students annually for future studies and course choice. - Supervised 6 student internships at various organizations so far, and student internship projects (such as the "SMS notification system for patient appointments" at the Oasis Hospital in Al Ain). - Non-UAEU students performing internships in my lab, such as Mohammed Al Shamsi of HCT, who has built a cell-phone operated hexapod which has received media attention in the UAE
ii. Graduate.
iii. Other advising activities (advising student groups, special assignments, recruiting, faculty mentorship, etc.)
Have performed active recruiting through multiple means for the college of IT and my lab. After advertising through mailing lists, directed emails, phone, etc. in 2008 more than 50 candidates applied for positions at UAEU, including top-notch faculty candidates such as: Jacob Crandall (was MIT Postdoc), Alan Wagner (CMU PhD) etc. Also, interviewed candidates (phone and videoconference). Files containing documentation available upon request. At MIT, have performed mentorship of younger Media Lab / EECS international students, as well as of students of the MIT Hellenic Students Association, in which I had served in multiple key positions. f. Advising: Supervising Student Research.
i. Undergraduate Advising.
Steve Liu, UROP Project, MIT EECS (2003) "A parallelized and streamlined vision front-end for tabletop robots" Steve Liu graduated with his B.Sc. in EECS from MIT in 2004 Stephen Oney , UROP Project, MIT EECS (2004) "Quantifying GSM performance through the flock of birds sensor" Stephen Oney
ii. Masters Advising.
D. Pantazis M.Eng. Diploma Thesis for AUTH ECE dept., at ITI (2001): "2D and 3D Face Recognition Using Embedded Hidden Markov Models" D. Pantazis is research faculty at USC, after completing his PhD there. K. Nikou M.Eng. Diploma Thesis for AUTH ECE dept., at ITI (2001): "Detecting salient facial feature points" K. Nikou is currently at Telas, after having worked at Siemens Europe etc.
iii. Doctoral Advising.
Started advising Panos Toulis
i. Departmental
Created presentation and introduced candidate students to the Intelligent Systems Track.
ii. College.
Member of Outreach Committee, 2009-2010 Member of Student Recruitment Committee, 2008-2009
International workshop in Interactive Robots and Media organized and successfully took place as part of Innovations ’08 conference Supervision of internships of 4 CIT student groups Organization of 3 guest lectures with international academics
iv. University.
CIT Dean Selection Committee 2009:
Served as one of two CIT faculty members, examining applications and participating in telephone and face-2-face interviews of candidate deans. PhD Program Preparation: Wrote draft recommendations document regarding outline of PhD program specifics, also including cross-comparison with programs of top international universities, and submitted to top administration. GCC Cognitive Science Society: One of the two founding members of the society, which has more than 20 members, ranging across IT, neuroscience, linguistics, philosophy, medical imaging, psychology, which have spanned across three universities and two countries. Organized an international workshop in cognitive science as part of Innovations 08. Mailing list, website, as well as reading group with average attendance of 20 (faculty and students), with more than ten enthusiastic two-hour presentations per semester – more info on website. Furthermore, took part in the writing of multiple proposals and documents: - Interdisciplinary project proposal for UAEU RA regarding fMRI augmentation and support of society activities - MSc in Cognitive Sciences proposal - PhD program proposal - Research Center in Cognitive Systems and Sciences Shanghai Lectures in Embodied Intelligence: Facilitated participation of UAEU in the famous international video-conference and online collaboration environment-based lecture series (organized by Rolf Pfeiffer), with participation of research assistants and students. "Best pipe inspection robot" award at Schlumberger i-Design: During academic year 2008-2009, advised team of two CIT students which together with two more UAEU students and four TokyoTech students designed and built a prototype of an oil-pipe inspection robot, as part of the international i-Design Schlumberger course. The course was comprised of videoconference and recorded lectures, assignments, and culminated to a three-day marathon at Schlumberger Abu Dhabi before the testing of the prototypes and the handing out of the award. c. Community, Local, and National. Worldwide publicity for the IRML lab, CIT, UAEU, UAE, and the field: BBC News and media of >20 countries covered "FaceBots", including: Front page appearance and 4-page article on UAE National TV News Spots at greek TV stations ANT1, MEGA, SKY, Makedonia TV Wired Magazine, Coriera De La Sera, Die Presse, Telecinco TV etc. AFP-released videos and article on our robots to TV worldwide 4. Contact Information Dr. Nikolaos Mavridis Interactive Robots and Media Lab College of IT, Maqam Campus UAE University 17551 Al Ain UAE Tel: +971-3-7135654 / 5657 Cell: +971-50-1375283 Fax: +971-3-7672018 Email: nmav@alum.mit.edu