San Gultekin, Meta Platforms, Inc., United States

San Gultekin received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey, in 2011 and 2013, respectively. He earned his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University in New York City in 2019.
His research lies at the intersection of signal processing and machine learning, with a particular focus on Bayesian models, variational inference, and time series analysis. He has worked at Goldman Sachs on securities data analysis and as a research scientist at Yahoo Labs, specializing in Demand Side Platform advertising.
He is currently a Senior Machine Learning Engineer at Meta, where he focuses on in-video advertising and ranking algorithms.

 

Sergo Shavgulidze, Georgian Technical University, Georgia

SERGO SHAVGULIDZE (Member, IEEE) received the Diploma with Excellence in Communication Engineering from the Georgian Technical University, Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1980, the Candidate of Technical Sciences degree from the Institute for Control Problems, Moscow, Russia, in 1984, and the Doctor of Technical Sciences degree from the Institute for Information Transmission Problems, Moscow, Russia, in 1991. He is currently a Professor at the Georgian Technical University and at the University of Georgia. He also serves on the Communications Commission of Georgia, where he is a member of the Advisory Board. From 2007 to 2008, he was an Associate Member of the Information and Communications Security Panel under the NATO Science for Peace and Security Program. He headed the Georgian delegation to RA-2007, WRC-2007, RA-2015, WRC-2015, RA-2019, and RA-2023, and was elected Vice-Chairman of ITU-R Study Group 5 (Terrestrial Services) at RA-2015 and RA-2019, as well as Vice-Chairman of ITU-R Study Group 7 (Science Services) at RA-2023.
His research interests include communication systems with a special emphasis on (generalized) concatenated codes, woven codes, coded continuous phase modulation, spatial modulation, and space-time coding, as well as flash memory endurance and data retention. He has authored over 190 publications on these subjects. On leave from the Georgian Technical University, he has held research positions at Linköping University and Lund University in Sweden; Darmstadt Technical University, Konstanz University of Applied Sciences, and Ulm University in Germany; the Technical University of Denmark in Lyngby, Denmark; and Lancaster University and HW Communications Ltd. in the UK.

 

Ioanna Miliaresi, Ionian University, Greece

Dr. Ioanna Miliaresi studied Physics at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, where she also earned a Master of Science degree in Electronics and Telecommunications. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Piraeus, specializing in digital audio processing.
Her professional background includes extensive experience in the telecommunications industry. From 1998 to 2004, she worked as a Senior System Test Engineer at Siemens AE in Greece, contributing to the development and testing of carrier-grade voice services over IP/ATM networks and intelligent network platforms. During this period, she also collaborated with Siemens AG in Munich, Germany, where she participated in verification activities for Voice over IP and Remote Access Server applications.
In academia, Dr. Miliaresi served as a Lecturer of Applications at the Department of Sound and Musical Instruments Technology at the Technological Educational Institute of Ionian Islands from 2003 to 2018. Since 2018, she has been a Lecturer of Applications in the Department of Audio and Visual Arts at the Ionian University, focusing on digital audio processing and sound technology.
Her research interests include artificial intelligence, digital signal processing, and complex systems modeling, with applications in audio analysis and healthcare diagnostics. She has authored scientific publications, participated in European Union–funded research projects, and serves as a reviewer for major international conferences such as the IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (ICASSP), the IEEE Workshop on Machine Learning for Signal Processing (MLSP), and the International Joint Conference on Neural Networks (IJCNN). She is also actively involved in the organization of international scientific conferences, including the International Conference on Frontiers of Signal Processing (ICFSP) and the Digital Culture & Audiovisual Challenges (DCAC) conference series.

Ronakkumar N Patel, Charotar University of Science and Technology, India

Ronakkumar N. Patel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Engineering at Chandubhai S. Patel Institute of Technology (CSPIT), CHARUSAT University, Gujarat, India. With over 12 years of teaching and research experience, Assis. Prof. Patel has cultivated deep expertise in Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Recommender Systems, and Cross-Domain Recommendation.
His research focuses on solving real-world problems such as the cold-start issue in recommender systems, leveraging auxiliary information across domains, and designing hybrid models that integrate visual, textual, and behavioral features. He has developed advanced frameworks that utilize item images, user reviews, and user behavior to enhance personalization and adaptability in recommendation systems.
Prof. Patel has published several peer-reviewed papers in reputed international journals and conferences indexed in Scopus and Web of Science. He is also actively involved in academic reviewing and has served as a reviewer and session chair for numerous international conferences in AI, ML and data science domains.

 

Umesh Chandra Pati, National Institute of Technology, India (Online Presentation)

Umesh C. Pati is a Full Professor at the Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, National Institute of Technology (NIT), Rourkela. He has obtained his B.Tech. Degree in Electrical Engineering from National Institute of Technology (NIT), Rourkela, Odisha. He received both M.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering with specialization in Instrumentation and Image Processing, respectively, from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. 
His current areas of interest are Image/Video Processing, Computer Vision, Artificial Intelligence, Medical Imaging, Internet of Things (IoT), Industrial Automation, and Instrumentation Systems. He has authored/edited Three books and published more than 150 articles in peer-reviewed international journals and conference proceedings. He has served as a reviewer in a wide range of reputed international journals and conferences. He has delivered a number of keynote as well as invited talks on various international and national platforms. Dr. Pati has filed 4 Indian patents. Besides other sponsored projects, he is currently associated with a high-value IMPRINT project, “Intelligent Surveillance Data Retriever (ISDR) for Smart City Applications,” which is an initiative of the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Govt. of India. 
He has visited countries like the USA, Italy, Austria, Australia, Singapore, Mauritius, Bangladesh, Nepal, etc., in connection with research collaboration and paper presentations. He was also an academic visitor to the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, San Diego State University, USA, and the Institute for Automation, University of Leoben, Austria. He is a Senior member of IEEE, Fellow of The Institution of Engineers (India), Fellow of The Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers (IETE), and life member of various professional bodies like MIR Labs (USA), The Indian Society for Technical Education, Instrument Society of India, Computer Society of India, and Odisha Bigyan Academy. His biography has been included in the 32nd edition of MARQUIS Who’s Who in the World 2015. He is also a recipient of Torchbearer of Education Award 2020 by Coding Ninjas.

 

 

Ruksar Fatima, KBN College of Engineering, India (Online Presentation)

Prof. Ruksar Fatima is an accomplished academic professional with over two decades of progressive experience in the education sector, holding pivotal roles at Khaja Banda Nawaz University and KBN College of Engineering. Expertise encompasses comprehensive management of academic programs, enhancement of institutional processes, and leadership in both administrative and examination capacities. Demonstrates a robust history in developing strategic initiatives that significantly improve educational standards, operational efficiency, and student engagement. Adept at leading cross-functional teams to achieve institutional goals and maintaining compliance with accreditation standards. Holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering, complemented by a rich portfolio of published research that contributes to advancements in engineering and technology education.