Apresentação Pessoal

Aníbal Ferreira received his Ph.D. degree in Electrical and Computers Engineering from the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, Portugal, in 1998. Dr. Ferreira is Professor (Assistant Lecturer in 1995, Assistant Professor in 1999, and Associate Professor since 2012) at the Electrical and Computers Engineering Department of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, where he lectures in the areas of signal theory, physiological signal processing, multimedia, and telecommunications.

He started his research career in 1988 at Philips Research Labs, in Eindhoven (The Netherlands), in the area of automatic VLSI silicon compilation of signal processing blocks.

In 1990/91 and in 1993, he was a consultant at AT&T Bell Laboratories Murray Hill, New Jersey, in the area of perceptual audio coding. This work led to significant contributions concerning proprietary solutions currently in use today for satellite radio broadcasting (SiriusXm Satellite Radio), as well as to the specification of the MPEG-Audio Advanced Audio Coder (AAC) standard.

Dr. Aníbal Ferreira has been affiliated with INESC TEC since 1987 (INESC TEC is an R&D private non-profit organization recognized as Associate Laboratory by the Portuguese Ministry of Science and having the University of Porto as the main associate), firstly as a research engineer between 1987 and 1996, and then as project manager between 1997 and 2000, as Coordinator of the Audio Signal Processing Area (within the Multimedia and Telecommunications Unit) between 2001 and 2003, and as entrepreneurship-oriented researcher since 2004. In addition to participating in several European research projects, he has been the coordinator of six Portuguese research projects in the areas of real-time audio analysis, synthesis, compression, modification, transcription and singing voice analysis, and the Portuguese coordinator of a joint Tunisian-Portuguese project on dysphonic voice analysis and reconstruction. All these projects were sponsored by FCT, the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology.

In 1998 Dr. Ferreira was an ex-aequo winner of the Portuguese IBM Prize that distinguishes research work in theoretical and applied computing.

Dr. Ferreira has been involved in several entrepreneurial initiatives. In 2004 he won a NORTINOV prize for a technology-based startup company in the North of Portugal, and in 2006 he obtained financial support from the Portuguese Innovation Agency (NEOTEC Program) to help the start of a spin-off company. As a founder of this company (Seegnal Research), he helped to develop innovative technologies, between 2007 and 2015, in the areas of acoustic voice quality assessment, biofeedback assistant in stuttering treatment, visual feedback of the singing voice, and general real-time audio processing. Since 2004, Dr. Ferreira is also Chief Technology Advisor at ATC Labs (ATC Labs.), a New Jersey start-up devoted to audio and video processing and communication.

As a result of his academic, research and entrepreneurial activities, he has been the supervisor of 7 PhD students (5 concluded) and 45 MSc students.

Dr. Ferreira is author or co-author of more than 100 peer-reviewed scientific publications (including journal and conference papers), 4 book chapters, and 2 international patents.

His research interests include psychoacoustics, audio and speech analysis, synthesis and coding, multirate filter banks, acoustic analysis of the spoken and singing voice, dysphonic voice reconstruction, and audio forensics. Dr. Ferreira is a member of the following professional societies: Audio Engineering Society (AES), and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).

As an appreciator of cultural (and organizational) diversity, Dr. Ferreira has visited several universities, namely in the context of sabbatical leaves, including:

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Massachusetts, USA, 2020 (2 months);
• Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), Pennsylvania, USA, 2010 (1 week);
• Georgia Institute of Technology (GaTech), Atlanta, Georgia, USA, 2010 (1 week);
• Rutgers University, Piscataway, New Jersey, USA, 2006 (3 months).

Other than family, teaching, research, and innovation commitments, the number one social cause Dr. Ferreira is motivated to involves natural environment protection and, in particular, a civic initiative (Portugal.Sem.Incendios.Florestais) addressing the periodic tragedy of forest fires in Portugal, every Summer (awareness video 1, video 2, video 3 and video 4).

His favorite hobbies are sports (running, swimming, cycling), and drumming.