2 Research Associates at Research Centre on Interactive Media, Smart Systems and Emerging Technologies

The Research Centre on Interactive Media, Smart System and Emerging Technologies – RISE LTD (www.rise.org.cy) is a newly founded research centre of excellence in Nicosia, Cyprus. RISE LTD is a significant investment supported by the European Commission, the Republic of Cyprus and its founding Partners, the Municipality of Nicosia, Max Planck Institute, University College London, the University of Cyprus, the Cyprus University of Technology and the Open University of Cyprus. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme H2020-WIDESPREAD-01-2016-2017 (Teaming Phase 2) under grant agreement No. 739578, as well as from the Cypriot Government, local and international partners, and other sponsors.

The Centre conducts excellent, internationally competitive scientific research in the areas of visual sciences, human factors and design, communication, and artificial intelligence delivered by high-calibre multidisciplinary research teams. RISE engages in knowledge transfer and innovation activities aiming to bridge the gap between scientific research and STEM-led innovation and entrepreneurship.

The research focus of RISE is on interactive media, smart systems, and emerging technologies. Interactive media have become an integral part of our lives, changing the way that information is conveyed to the user and the ways users interact with devices, with other people, and with the world around them. Smart systems have offered a novel way of producing automated solutions to hard problems for which the mere use of the human intellect is insufficient. Research in RISE integrates the Visual Sciences, Human Factors & Design, and Communications & Artificial Intelligence, in a tight synergy that provides a unique interdisciplinary research perspective that emphasizes an “Inspired by Humans, Designed for Humans” philosophy. RISE is designed to act as an integrator of academic research and industrial innovation, towards the sustainable fuelling of the scientific, technological, and economic growth of Cyprus and Europe. For more information about RISE, please visit www.rise.org.cy.

The Socially-Competent Robotic and Agent Technologies (SCRAT) MRG focuses on the design and development of human-centered AI-driven technologies for physical robots or virtual agents. The MRG’s work draws inspiration from cognitive psychology and the social sciences, recognizing that value can increase when machines work with humans rather than only for humans. Humans are viewed as the collaborators or coaches of machines, helping, and being helped by, machines to achieve their joint goals. This in turn, necessitates technologies that can interact competently with humans in a decision-supporting role and at a level that is socially and cognitively compatible with the individual(s) interacting with those technologies. The MRG builds upon techniques from machine learning, learning theory, natural language processing and generation, preference elicitation, knowledge acquisition and representation, commonsense reasoning, formal argumentation, cognitive computing, and explainable AI.