Plenary & Keynote Lectures
Date & times to be defined
Dr. Alice Cicirello
Assistant Professor in Applied Mechanics, Cambridge University Engineering Department
Theme: Noise and Vibration Challenges through the Physics-Enhanced Machine Learning lens
Dr Alice Cicirello is a University Assistant Professor in Applied Mechanics at the Cambridge University Engineering Department and a Fellow of Churchill College. She is the founder and head of the Data, Vibration and Uncertainty group (https://sites.google.com/view/dvugroup). Alice is currently an Alexander von Humboldt Experienced Research Fellow (2023- present), and Executive board member of the European Association of Structural Dynamics. Alice was the chair of the first (2022), second (2023) and third (2024) workshops on Physics-enhancing Machine Learning in Applied Mechanics.
Alice obtained her PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2013. She was a Marie Curie Early Stage Researcher (2009-2012) and a Research Associate (2012-2014) at the same institution. Alice worked as a Senior Research Scientist at SLB (2014-2017) and returned to academia as a Lecturer at the University of Oxford (Engineering Science Department and Balliol College, 2017-2019), and then continued as an Associate Professor and Section Head at TU Delft (2020-2023).
Alice is serving in the Editorial boards of Data-Centric Engineering, Nonlinear Dynamics, Advances in Engineering Software, ASCE-ASME Journal of Risk and Uncertainty in Engineering Systems, Part A: Civil Engineering, and ASCE-ASME Journal of Risk and Uncertainty in Engineering Systems, Part B: Mechanical Engineering, and has served in the scientific committee and organising committee of several international workshops and conferences.
Alice held visiting positions at several research institutions, including MIT, the Alan Turing Institute and the University of Oxford. Recently, Alice has delivered keynote speeches at the AI UK 2024 fringe event workshop Latest Developments in Physics-Informed Machine Learning’, Imperial College London and at the 11th European Nonlinear Dynamics Conference (ENOC 24).
Monika Rychtarikova
Professor, Faculty of Architecture at KU Leuven
Theme: The Sound of Sustainability: Noise Matters in Retrofitted Architecture.
Monika Rychtarikova is a professor at the Faculty of Architecture at KU Leuven and the Faculty of Civil Engineering at STU Bratislava. She has worked in different fields of acoustics, building physics in general and architectural acoustics in particular. Her recent research aims at developing architectural designs that harmonically include aspects of sound, addressing questions of indoor and outdoor acoustic comfort, perception of sound and speech intelligibility in rooms on one hand and the development of new measurement techniques and characterisation and development of novel materials on the other hand. She has been involved as a researcher or coordinator in different European and national projects on virtual acoustics, echolocation, assessment of sound insulation in buildings, noise barrier research, acoustic and thermal retrofit of buildings and research in archeoacoustics.
She has been the chair of the Technical Committee on Room and Building Acoustics (EAA TC-RBA), board member of the International Commission for Acoustics (ICA) , board member of national acoustic societies of the Netherlands and Belgium and the president of Slovak Acoustic Society. She is the editor of the journal Acta Acustica. In 2016 she received the award “Female Scientist of the Year 2015” in Slovakia.
Prof. Julio A. Cordioli
Associate Professor at the Mechanical Engineering Department, UFSC
Theme: On the noise of electric aircrafts: from drones to electric airplanes
Prof. Julio A. Cordioli graduated in Mechanical Engineering from Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), Brazil, in 2000 and received his PhD in 2006 also from UFSC, with part of his PhD research developed at the University of Cambridge, UK. He has previously worked for EMBRAER (Brazil) on the design of noise control treatments for aircrafts, and for the ESI Group (USA), as an acoustic scientist on the development of vibroacoustic numerical methods. Since 2011, he has been an Associate Professor at the Mechanical Engineering Department, UFSC. His main research interests include: numerical methods in vibro-acoustics, aircrafts interior and exterior noise, aeroacoustics and vibration monitoring.
Nilesh Madhu
Head of Audio & Signal Processing, Interpretation and Enhancement (ASPIRE@IDLab) at Ghent University
Theme: The sound(ness) of data: From audio separation to ecosystem monitoring with data-driven machine learning
Nilesh Madhu heads the Audio & Signal Processing, Interpretation and Enhancement (ASPIRE@IDLab) group at Ghent University and imec, Belgium. His research interests include machine learning approaches for signal detection and enhancement, automated audio scene analysis and tagging, and automatic audio quality evaluation.
Key to the group’s research philosophy is leveraging signal processing expertise within data-driven, deep-learning-based approaches, to develop practical solutions for a wide range of applications. These range from communications to healthcare and automation.
Prof. Madhu was granted his Dr.-Ing. degree (summa cum laude) from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum in 2009, for his research on algorithms for acoustic source localisation and separation. Following this he was awarded a Marie-Curie fellowship for a two-year postdoctoral stay at the KU Leuven, Belgium, where he contributed to the fields of hearing prostheses and biomedical signal analysis. During his industry tenure at NXP Semiconductors, Belgium, he held the positions of principal scientist and resident genius (unfortunately, not an official designation). There, he and his team developed cutting-edge algorithms for audio and speech enhancement in mobile devices.
He believes passion for signal processing and a good balance between academic rigour and industry insights are key factors to successfully dealing with complex engineering challenges.
Dr. Bruno Masiero
Assistant Professor at the School of Electrical and Computing Engineering (FEEC) at the University of Campinas (Unicamp)
Theme: The sound(ness) of data: From audio separation to ecosystem monitoring with data-driven machine learning
Dr. Bruno Masiero is an Assistant Professor at the School of Electrical and Computing Engineering (FEEC) at the University of Campinas (Unicamp) whose work bridges the technical precision of electrical engineering with the creative world of sound. With expertise spanning binaural hearing, spatial audio reproduction, and machine learning applications for acoustic analysis, Dr. Masiero brings a distinctive approach to audio technology. After earning his PhD from RWTH Aachen University in Germany, he has led research in acoustic imaging, spatial audio reproduction, and the development of audiological evaluation tools. His recent pioneering work applies machine learning techniques to predict biodiversity collapse through acoustic monitoring—demonstrating how audio engineering can address urgent environmental challenges.
Noureddine Atalla
Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Université de Sherbrooke
Theme: Vibro-acoustics modeling of lightweight structures with attached noise control materials
Noureddine Atalla is a professor of Mechanical Engineering at Université de Sherbrooke. His core expertise is in computational vibro-acoustics and acoustic materials. He has authored over 200 papers in acoustics and vibration, encompassing a wide range of domains. His research includes the modeling of poroelastic and viscoelastic materials, the study of coupled fluid-structure problems, the investigation of the acoustic and dynamic response of sandwich and composite structures, as well as computational vibroacoustics. In addition to his scholarly articles, he has co-authored a book on the propagation of sound in media and another book on finite and boundary elements in structural acoustics and vibrations.
Li CHENG (成利)
Chair Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering at Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU)
