CompuCast

Hugh spent some time looking for computer science podcasts to listen to while he was pretending to exercise. He was so annoyed at not finding any that he decided to start one himself and, well, it seemed like a good way to avoid working on his PhD for while. Hugh was quite surprised that some of his friends wanted to join in, not just think he was nuts (though they probably thought that, too), and so CompuCast was born!

Hugh is researching machine learning in compilers at the University of Edinburgh. He just loves the idea of getting computers to do all the work for him and making them tweak compilers for him is exactly what he thinks they're for.

Helen is not entirely sure how she got herself into CompuCast, as her main field is more the science of the brain than the science of the computer. However, she thinks the idea of communicating interesting news is a great idea and is happy to learn about computer science from an interesting and well-presented podcast. She has also been inspired to think more about how to communicate her own area of research, computational neuroscience, more effectively.

Helen is a NDTC ( Neuroinformatics Doctoral Training Centre) student studying for a PhD that involves trying to understand spatial memory in mice, using both experimental biology and computational tools. She is in the institute for Adaptive and Neural Computation (iANC).

Edd is a part time freelance sound engineer who loves every single opportunity he gets to use his recording toys. And so when his friend Hugh told him he was going to start a computer science podcast, he naturally jumped at the opportunity.

Edd really enjoys working on CompuCast as he is slightly out of his comfort zone... he has somehow managed to get a speaking part which is very exciting if just a tad daunting!

If you like what you hear and would like help with a project then you can contact Edd on the email below.

Iain is very excited to be a correspondent on CompuCast and hopes that loads of other Computer Scientists will find it as interesting as he does.

Between tea-breaks, Iain is a DReaMer, a recreational mathematician, and a semi-professional informatics ping-pong player. He has beaten Helen and Dominik on at least one occasion.

Chris is a first year PhD student in LFCS. He had been thinking about trying his hand at popular science writing for computer science when he came across CompuCast and thought it was a great idea. He looks forward to attempting to get people excited about the latest research in computer science... no mean feat! There definitely should be more pop.comp.sci. in the media.

Chris likes the idea of a dedicated podcast for computer scientists. In particular, to get news about other areas of Informatics that he has little time to keep up with. Thus, he is delighted to provide regular updates on his favourite research areas: parallel architectures and compilation.

How he ended up as a correspondent, he is not quite sure. His memory is a bit hazy at this point... It somehow started with an invitation by Hugh to meet for a pint... he is not quite sure what happened next.

Compucast provides an opportunity to learn about all the fun and juicy stuff about computer science, in a situation where most of other times you are working on your own area; thats what Ali said as a readon for joining compucast.

For his PhD, he is not very sure yet what he is doing. His main area is modelling, simulation and verification of concurrent systems using process algebras. In particular, he wishes that one day he can improve PEPA, a modelling tool which he loves, to better model such systems.

When Hugh came up with the idea of a computer science podcast, Dominik was up for it straight away. In a field evolving as fast as computer science, it is important to stay up-to-date with current research and CompuCast is a great opportunity to do so.

For his PhD Dominik is working on compilation for heterogeneous multi-core computers. He's particularly interested in automatic mapping and code generation from high-level, parallel languages to OpenCL.

Gaya got hooked into CompuCast after chatting to Hugh on one of those free beer evenings at the Informatics Forum. Having just finished the PhD and having nothing better to do, she decided to join for the fun of it and also broaden her knowledge in AI and computer science.

Apart from being a long-time martial artist and a beginner at piano, Gaya is a post-doc at Edinburgh University, specialising in the construction and execution of flexible workflows for video processing. The current project she is involved with deals with the efficient processing of large videos of undersea fish!

Like all good academics, Ram has broad scientific interests and lots of opinions on topics of current scientific interest. Sometimes these opinions may be of broader interest beyond his usual professional audience, which is why he agreed to be an occasional presenter on CompuCast.

Ram leads a fledgling group of researchers at the University of Edinburgh, who study the problem of achieving robust autonomy and decision making in computational systems of various kinds - ranging from humanoid robots to autonomous agents in electronic markets.

Peter got talked into joining the podcast team after being introduced to Hugh at a wine reception, when his protestations that he "isn't really a computer scientist at all" fell on deaf ears. He does, however, enjoy communicating his research to others, most recently on a kids technology programme on the BBC.

Coming from a mathematics/linguistics background, Peter is a post-doc in the Centre for Speech Technology Research at the University of Edinburgh. He's currently building a speech-enabled computer tutoring system.

Robert Rothenberg has recently finished a PhD in proof theory at the University of St Andrews. His research interests are in the logic and mathematics of computer science. He also has degrees in philosophy, and interests in the social/political/ethical aspects of ubiquitous computing devices. (He balances the two worlds by considering computer science to be experimental philosophy.)

In previous eras of his life, Robert was a radio DJ and a student journalist. When he admitted this to Michael one evening, he was invited to join the crew of CompuCast.

Athina likes to keep busy with many stuff and thought the idea of communicating computer science was definitely worth a shot. After Helen's domineering request to do the CompuCast news, she had no option but to get involved.

Athina is doing a PhD in machine learning at the Institute for Adaptive and Neural Computation. She is interested in probabilistic models that can efficiently learn the complex structures found in sequential data and her current research focuses on modelling music as a generative process.

Aciel really enjoyed the first episode of CompuCast, so when she was approached by Hugh and Dominic, she did not hesitate to become part of the team. Aciel hopes to be able to communicate through podcasting the various interesting ideas she stumbles upon while researching.

Aciel is a first year PhD student at the Institute of Communication and Collaborative Systems, ICCS. Her research involves equipping machines with the ability to converse in a manner that is very similar to the way we humans converse, and that is by utilising an automated planning approach to dialogue.

Stuart got involved in CompuCast because Hugh bullied him into it and he has a pathological compulsion to say "yes". Apart from that he thinks CompuCast is a good idea and Hugh offered him the chance to interview Luis van Ahn (who must be the easiest person to interview on the planet).

The rest of the time Stuart is Director of Teaching and Deputy Head of School of Informatics and has research interests in social informatics where he works on things like trust and risk in socio-technical systems. Recently he's spent a lot of time thinking about "The Social Computer", how such a thing might be programmed and how to take advantage of human diversity and expertise in the social computer.

As one of Hugh's Ph.D students, it was an inevitability that Stephen would join the CompuCast crew - but there was absolutely no coercion, honest! Coming from a background of presenting radio shows on Edinburgh University's student radio station, Stephen is slowly coming to terms with the more structured format of the podcast, but he's enjoying talking about something a bit more serious than rock music!

Stephen is researching virtual machines used in smartphones - such as Android phones - in order to improve their energy efficiency, as he's fed up of having to charge his phone every night. Some may argue that he's not addressing the real problem, but hey, every little helps!

George is not good in communicating with others, especially when it comes to computer science. However, he joined CompuCast in an (vain) attempt to self-improve, and hopefully have others to listen to him.

He is a PhD student in the Institute for Computing Systems Architecture (ICSA), working on techniques for parallelising sequential applications and compiler-architecture synergistic approaches to improve powerperformance efficiency.

Martin also got dragged into CompuCast by Hugh, despite never having heard an episode when first asked. Normally slumming it down in the hardware lab, as a stray electronic engineer in a department full of computer scientists, he thought it might be a good chance to learn more about what everyone else in the building was actually talking about.

Martin's research interests lie in the field of wireless sensor networks, specialising primarily in human motion capture using networks of inertial and magnetic sensor devices.

Annette got recruited to Compucast during one of her many outreach activities. She's in the last few month of writing up her PhD on creating automated answers to clinical comparison questions.

Kornilios likes to use white-boards. He attended a Compucast meeting out of curiosity. There he presented something which he was certain it couldn't be explained without a white-board. When Hugh and Iain said that it could be easily done, he decided to give it a shot.

Kornilios got his PhD from the National Technical University of Athens. He is broadly interested in all aspects of computer science and computer engineering. His main research focus is parallel processing systems.

As head of the Informatics Graduate School, Don decided that financing CompuCast was an excellent use of funding for "transferrable skills training", despite the worrying fact that Hugh was in charge. He hasn't changed his mind yet.

When he's not helping with CompuCast, Don splits his time between being a professor in LFCS - with research interests in formal methods for software development, security, static analysis and functional programming - and running Contemplate, a spin-out company that is building automatic bug-finding tools for programmers.

Benji is not entirely sure how he became involved in CompuCast. He awoke in a daze one evening in the recording studio (after having heard much about this infamous project) and has found an ever-increasing stream of CompuCast-related emails in his inbox.

When not fighting zombies or saving damsels in distress, Benji sits hacking away at his PhD in robust decision-making, applied to autonomous robotics. In particular, he is interested in generalising skills to deal with the commonalities between various robotic tasks while handling resource bounds, incomplete information, partial observability and multiple decision-makers.

Zheng was persuaded to do podcast after Chris had promised to offer a glass of cider which has not turned up yet. Nevertheless, his first experience of podcast wasn't too bad.

Zheng is currently a postdoc researcher working in compilers and runtime systems for multi-cores. He is a photographer and enjoys many things, including jogging, go, sketch drawing and traditional Chinese paintings. Unlike Hugh and Chris, Zheng is a strong believer of "Don't be evil". (Ed) And unlike those two, Zheng may not live to see the next episode!

Mark has been involved in CompuCast by virtue of his research (and leisure) interests involving computer science and music. Athina was responsible for nudging him into doing an interview with a composer for the music special edition of CompuCast.

Mark is a PhD student in ILCC. He spends most of his time as a computation musician masquerading as a computational linguist and the rest as a computation linguist pretending to be a musician.