Prof. Dr. Stefan Wermter

• Neural Networks, Hybrid Knowledge Processing of Symbolic and Neural Representations, Cognitive Robotics, Multimodal Integration of Language and Vision, Data Mining, Machine Learning.

• Our objective in Knowledge Technology is to research into the foundations, representations and applications of hybrid intelligent systems. Our research is often motivated by natural systems, e.g. biology, cognition and the human brain. We want to exploit these foundations in order to build more sophisticated next-generation knowledge-based systems, adaptive human computer interaction systems, learning agents, self organising information systems and robotic engineering systems. For building such nature-inspired knowledge-based systems we integrate neural, statistical and/or symbolic representations into learning agents. Applications include interactive systems, data/text mining systems, cognitive and neuroscience-inspired robots, speech/language systems, and hybrid architectueres for vision.

• Diplom, Department of Computer Science, University of Dortmund, Germany (1987)
• Award Fellowship of the German Academic Exchange Service, Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, USA (1987-1988)
• Research Assistant, Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts, USA (1988-1989)
• Master of Science, Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts, USA (1989)
• Research Associate and Lecturer, Department of Computer Science, University of Dortmund, Germany (1990-1991)
• PhD, Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Germany (1993)
• Research Scientist, Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Germany; leading working group on hybrid neural processing (1991-1997)
• Visiting Research Scientist, International Computer Science Institute, Berkeley, California, USA (1997)
• Higher Doctorate (Habilitation), Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Germany. Learning of robust language processing in hybrid neural architectures (1998)
• Professor of Computer Science, Chair for Intelligent Systems, School of Computing and Technology, University of Sunderland, England (1998-2010)
• Professor of Computer Science, Chair for Knowledge Technology,  Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Germany (2010-)

I have coordinated and participated in a number of projects, including:

• SOcial Cognitive Robotic Agents in The European Society (SOCRATES)
• Transregio-Sonderforschungsbereich TRR 169 Cross-Modal Learning (CML)
• European Training Network: Safety Enables Cooperation in Uncertain Robotic Environments (SECURE)
• Echo State Networks for Developing Language Robots (EchoRob)
• Cooperating Robots (CoRob)
• Gestures and Reference Instructions for Deep robot learning (GRID)
• Teaching With Interactive Reinforcement Learning (TWIRL)
• Cognitive Assistive Systems (CASY)
• Cross-modal Interaction in Natural and Artificial Cognitive Systems (CINACS)
• Robotics for the Development of Cognition (RobotDoc)
• Knowledgeable SErvice Robots for Aging (KSERA)
• What it means to communicate (NESTCOM)
• Midbrain Computational and Robotic Auditory Model for focused Hearing (MiCRAM)
• Biomimetic Multimodal Learning in a Mirror Neuron-based Robot (MirrorBot)
• Emerging computational neural architectures based on neuroscience (EmerNet)
• Experimental and Neurocomputational Investigations of Cognitive Systems (ENICS)
• Towards helpdesk automation using scanning language understanding and hybrid neural language techniques (HelpNet)
• Localising and Tracking Sound in a neurally inspired robot (TRACKBOT)
• European Network Robotics Network of Excellence (Partner member in EURON2)
• Hybrid neural intelligent agents (HyNeT)
• Hybrid systems and hybrid Methodology (HyM)
• Hybrid neural spoken language systems (SCREEN)
• Hybrid neural, rule-based and case-based eValuation (HyValue)
• Formal unification for language processing (Vesuv)

A list of current and recent project can be found at the Project page of the Knowledge Technology research group.

Completed and awarded (only recent ones since 2002):

• Ken McGarry – Rule extraction and knowledge transfer from radial basis function neural networks (2003)
• Li Hung – An adaptive SOM model for document clustering using hybrid neural techniques (2004)
• Sheila Garfield – Hybrid processing for spoken language classification (2004)
• Stephen Womble – Temporal sequence learning from a neocortical perspective (2004)
• Christo Panchev – Spatio-temporal and multimodal processing in a spiking neural mind of a robot (2005)
• Mark Elshaw – Multimodal neural grounding of language processing for robot actions (2005)
• Dale Addison – A biologically plausible strategy for the avoidance of catastrophic interference (2005)
• John Murray – Trackbot: Acoustic tracking with a Peoplebot (2006)
• Garen Arevian – Recurrent neural networks for text classification of news articles from the Reuters Corpus (2007)
• Wolfgang Schmidle – A model of neural sequence detectors for sentence processing (2007)
• David Muse – A neural robot control architecture based on actor-critic reinforcement learning (2008)
• Abdulrahman Althahan – Variable lambda and conjugate temporal difference methods for visual robot homing (2009)
• Alan Yau Yung – A biologically inspired neural architecture for emotional robots (2010)
• Kiran Ravulakollu – Sensory integration model inspired by the superior colliculus for multimodal stimuli localization (2012)
• Nandita Tripathi – Two-level text classification using hybrid machine learning techniques (2012)
• Jens Kleesiek – Action-driven perception – neural architectures based on sensorimotor principles (2012)
• Naveed Anwar – Data Mining of Audiology Data (2014)
• Junpei Zhong – Artificial Neural Models for Feedback Pathways for Sensorimotor Integration (2014)
• Johannes Bauer – One Computer Scientist's (Deep) Superior Colliculus. Modeling, understanding, and learning from a multisensory midbrain structure (2015)
• Wenjie Yan – Indoor Vision-based Robot Navigation: a Neural Probabilistic Approach (2016)
• Nicolás Navarro-Guerrero – Neurocomputational Mechanisms for Adaptive Self-Preservative Robot Behaviour (2016)
• Stefan Heinrich – Natural Language Acquisition in Recurrent Neural Architectures (2016)

• Board of European Neural Network Society (elected for 2007-2016 period)
• Associate Editor of Transaction on Neural Networks and Learning Systems
• Associate Editor of Hybrid Intelligent Systems
• Associate Editor of Connection Science
• Associate Editor of Knowledge and Information Systems
• Editorial Board and Action Editor of Neural Networks until 2014
• Editorial Board of Cognitive Systems Research
• Editorial Board of International Journal of Computational Intelligence and Applications
• Editorial Board of Neural Computing Surveys
• Editorial Board of Neural Information Processing - Letters and Reviews
• Editorial Board of International Journal of Computational Intelligence
• Editorial Board of Cognitive Computation
• Member of IEEE Autonomous Mental Development Technical Committee (AMDTC)
• Member of the EPSRC College Prioritization Panel of Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council 2006-2010
• Recent Programme Committees

If you are looking for an interesting Postdoc or PhD research project, e.g. PhD around the following research topics, you could email(%20wermter"AT"informatik.uni-hamburg.de). Sometimes there are a restricted number of PhD studentships available on related and other topics. Furthermore, research / training opportunities exist from the EU for European researchers as Marie Curie Fellowships at different levels: predoc, postdoc, or advanced senior researcher. We are interested to host researchers who would like to strengthen the research in our team.

I have taught mainly in the areas of:

• Neural Networks
• Bioinspired Artificial Intelligence
• Knowledge Processing
• Machine Learning
• Knowledge-based Systems
• Information Systems
• Intelligent Systems
• Hybrid Neural Symbolic Systems
• Natural Language Processing
• Automatic Knowledge Acquisition
• Cognitive Robotics

• 2017 Workshop towards Intelligent Social Robots: Social Cognitive Systems in Smart Environments (at RO-MAN 2017), organised by Amir Aly, Sascha Griffiths, Verena Nitsch, Tadahiro Taniguchi, Stefan Wermter, Adriana Tapus; Lisbon, Portugal.
• 2016 Workshop on Bio-inspired Social Robot Learning in Home Scenarios (on IROS 2016), organised by Francisco Cruz, Jimmy Baraglia, Stefan Wermter, Yukie Nagai, Daejeon, KR
• 2014 International Conference on Artificial Neural Networks, organised by General Chair Stefan Wermter, the Program Co-Chairs and Local Organising Committee, Hamburg, DE
• 2012 Postgraduate Conference on Robotics and Development of Cognition (RobotDoC-PhD), organised by Angelo Cangelosi, Francesca Stramandinoli, Stefan Wermter, Lausanne, CH
• 2009 Meeting of Natural Computing Application Forum: Intelligent Robotics, organised by Stefan Wermter, Michael Knowles, Martin Page, Sunderland, UK
• 2008 International Workshop on Minds, brains, networks, communication and robots, organised by Stefan Wermter, Vittorio Gallese, Friedemann Pulvermueller, Edinburgh, Scotland
• 2007 International Workshop on what it means to communicate based on neural, cognitive and computational evidence, organised by Stefan Wermter, Vittorio Gallese, Friedemann Pulvermueller, Porto, Portugal
• 2005 International AI Workshop on Neurobotics, Ulm, Germany organised by Guenther Palm, Stefan Wermter, Mark Elshaw, Ulm, Germany
• 2000 International Workshop on Current Computational Architectures Integrating Neural Networks and Neuroscience, organized by Stefan Wermter, David Willshaw, Durham, UK
• 1999 EmerNet International Workshop on Emergent Neural Computational Architectures based on Neuroscience organized by Stefan Wermter, Jim Austin, David Willshaw, Edinburgh, Scotland
• 1999 AAAI Conference workshop on Neuroscience and Neural Computation organized by Jim Austin, Stefan Wermter, and Vasant Honavar, Orlando, USA
• 1998 Interdisciplinary conference, Hybrid Neural and Symbolic Language Processing, Invited Lecture Session, Stefan Wermter
• 1998 NIPS Conference Workshop on Neural Symbolic Integration, organised by Stefan Wermter, Ron Sun, Colorado, USA
• 1997 Workshop on Connectionist, Statistical and Symbolic Representations and Natural Language Processing, organized by Stephan Busemann, Karin Harbusch, Stefan Wermter
• 1995 International Workshop on New Approaches to Learning for Natural Language Processing, organised by Stefan Wermter, Gabriele Scheler, Ellen Riloff, Montreal, Canada

• I served as the editor for book review articles until 2015 for the journal of Cognitive Systems Research. Further information on previous book review articles and a list of books can be found here.

Wermter, S., Weber, C., Duch, W., Honkela, T., Koprinkova-Hristova, P., Magg, S., Palm, G., Villa, A.E.P. (Eds.) Artificial Neural Networks and Machine Learning -- ICANN 2014, 24th International Conference on Artificial Neural Networks, Springer Heidelberg, 2014.

S. Wermter, M. Page, M. Knowles, V. Gallese, F. Pulvermuller and J. Taylor. Neural Network: Special Issue on What it Means to Communicate. Volume 22, Number 2, March, 2009.

Wermter S., Palm G., Elshaw M. (Eds.) Biomimetic Neural Learning for Intelligent Robots. Springer, Heidelberg, Germany. 2005.

S. Wermter S., Austin J., Willshaw D. (Eds.) Emergent Neural Computational Architectures based on Neuroscience. Springer, Heidelberg, Germany, 2001.

S. Wermter, R. Sun (Eds.) Hybrid Neural Systems. Springer Verlag, Heidelberg, 2000.

S. Wermter, E. Riloff, G. Scheler (Ed). Connectionist, Statistical and Symbolic Approaches to Learning for Natural Language Processing Springer Verlag, Berlin, 1996.

Wermter S. 1995. Hybrid Connectionist Natural Language Processing. Chapman and Hall, International Thomson Computer Press, London, UK, 1995.

Wermter S. Learning of Robust Language Processing in Hybrid Connectionist Architectures. Higher Doctorate (Habilitation) thesis. Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany. 1998. (in German) 302pp.

Wermter S. A Hybrid Connectionist Approach for a Scanning Understanding of Natural Language Phrases. Doctoral thesis, Department of Computer Science, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany. 1993.