About
I 'm currently a Research Director at the Artificial Intelligence and Learning Systems Lab of the Institute of Communication and Computer Systems, National Technical University of Athens; I'm also the Head of Game Programming for SAE Athens, a validated college of the Middlesex University. In my research, I'm looking for ways to make computer systems more aware of and responsive to the way people interact with each other using natural, affective interaction and intelligent, user-adaptive algorithms. I'm also investigating how gamification and digital games can be used in classroom and informal settings to assist conventional teaching and help teach social issues and STEAM subjects to children and adults.
Since 1998, I have participated in more than twenty research projects funded by Greek and European bodies; most notably the Humaine Network of Excellence, within which I completed my post-doc in the field of mapping signals to signs of emotion, leading research efforts in emotion modelling and recognition, the FP6 IP CALLAS project, where I served as Area Leader of Affective applications, the FP7 TeL Siren project (Technical Manager), which was voted Best Learning Game in Europe for 2013 by the Games and Learning Alliance Network of Excellence, and the H2020 iRead project, which produced Navigo, the winner of the GALA Serious Games competition for 2018. Siren is also at #4 in the ‘Great Examples’ section of the ‘Games for Impact’ list of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP).
In the past, I 've worked as an Adjunct Lecturer for NTUA (2007), the Univ. of Piraeus (2004-10, 16-18) and the Univ. of West Macedonia (18-19), teaching subjects related to Computer Graphics, Game Development, Virtual Reality, HCI, Assistive Computing, ICT in education, Image Processing, Data Mining, Robotics and e-health services. I'm currently a Lecturer on Digital methods and Strategic communication at the M.A. programme in Sustainable Tourism & Communication Technologies, European Communication Institute.
I am the Student Activities Chair and Computer Chapter Chair for IEEE Greece, member of the BoD for the gi-Cluster of Corallia, which consists of industrial and academic members of the game and creative ecosystem in Greece, and Chairman of the Board of the Hellenic Association of Computer Engineers. I’m a member of the Editorial Board for the Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces (Springer), Personal and Ubiquitous Computing (Springer) Journal on Synthetic Emotions (IGI), and Frontiers in ICT and Frontiers in Digital Humanities (Frontiers In). Google Scholar reports 4160+ citations to my work, h-index=34 and i10-index=78 (May 2020) and Impactio ranks me in the top 0.01% in Artificial Intelligence and top 3.63% in Machine Learning.
Besides this, I'm involved in a number of science communication activities, most notably Famelab Greece, openscience.gr, and House of Makers, a grassroots initiative which aims to promote STEM and make-ing activities attractive to young students. I'm also an advocate for technology and CS in schools, participating in the Girls Go Coding initiative to attract girls and female adults to coding. In November 2014, I co-founded a start-up called LeXIS which develops personalised word games for children and adults with dyslexia and other learning disorders; LeXIS graduated from the accelerator programme run by the Greek Industry Association (SEV) and was showcased in several pitching events. In fall 2016, I authored a lesson on the TED-ed platform titled "Can machines read your emotions?"; the lesson surpassed 300.000 views in its first week and has been used by more than 240 teachers. I'm a 3x TEDx Speaker; you can find those plus other talks in this YouTube playlist.
Resume
Studies
Dipl. Ing. in Electrical and Computer Engineering
1991 - 1997
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National Technical University of Athens, Greece
PhD in Computer Science
1997 – 2001
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National Technical University of Athens, Greece
Honours and awards
Best paper nominee
2019
Games and Learning Alliance (GALA) conference
Game Competition finalist
2018
for Navigo, European Conference on Game-based Learning
Best science communication website award
2018
for openscience.gr, Athens Science Festival
European learning game of the year
2018
for Navigo, Games and Learning Alliance (GALA)
Game Competition finalist
2013
for Siren, European Conference on Game-based Learning
European learning game of the year
2013
for Siren, Games and Learning Alliance (GALA)
Design award
2012
Intel Ultrabook competition
Best paper award
2012
12th international workshop on image analysis for multimedia interactive services conference (WIAMIS)
Academic Positions
Research Director
2015 - Present
Institute of Communication and Computer Systems,
National Technical University of Athens
Head of Game Programming
Oct 2018 - Present
SAE Athens (accredited college by Middlesex University)
Current R&D Projects
erasmus+
2016 - 2019
Europe in Crisis (eCrisis) - http://ecrisis.eu/
H2020 Innovaction Action
2017 - 2020
iRead: Infrastructure and integrated tools for personalized learning of reading skill - https://iread-project.eu/
Europeana DSI
2018 - 2020
Deployment and Maintenance of Europeana Digital Service Infra-structure core services
H2020 Health
2019 - 2022
ECoWeB: Assessing and Enhancing emotional competence for Well-being in the young - http://www.ecowebproject.eu/
erasmus+
2019 - 2022
LearnML: Learning Machine Learning - http://learnml.eu/
erasmus+
2019 - 2022
INCLUDE: Integrating Content and Language via a Unified Digital Environment - https://www.include-erasmus.eu/
GSRT
2020 - 2022
Mediludus: Personalised medical care through game mechanics & gamification
Contact
Email:
kkarpou(at)cs(dot)ntua(dot)gr
Call:
+30 210 7723037