Prof. Manolis Tsiknakis and other members of the Laboratory are involved in the teaching of both undergraduate and postgraduate courses at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the School of Engineering in general.
Undergraduate Courses
Bioinformatics and Simulation of Physiological Systems
Multimedia eHealth Services
Innovation, the Internet and Entrepreneurship
Management of ICT Projects
Technical Terms and Writing
Graduate Courses
Research methods and Project Management
Bioinformatics and Simulation of Physiological Systems
The course consists of two main sections:
- Introduction to Bioinformatics
- Simulation of Physiological Systems
Bioinformatics
– Introduction to Bioinformatics: basic concepts, applications
– Databases, tools, open – source software.
– Similarity between sequences, BLAST (Basic Local Alignment Search Tool) algorithms and other alignment algorithms.
– The protein structure, determination of three-dimesional structure of proteins.
– Microarrays, image analysis, data analysis.
– Systems biology, cellular models.
– Bioinformatics applications in the discovery of new drugs and personalized treatment.
Simulation of Physiological Systems
– Basic principles of modeling.
– Methods of modeling physiological systems.
– Theory of linear control and non – linear control.
– Analysis and identification of open and closed loop physiological systems.
– Machine learning methods for the simulation and control of physiological systems. Examples from cardiovascular, respiratory system, nervous system, metabolic system.
– Use of special software for the analysis and simulation of physiological systems. Computational requirements and architectures.
Multimedia eHealth Services
The course is introductory to biomedical informatics and covers the basic concepts that are necessary to familiarize the students with this field. The course consists of two basic sections; biomedical informatics and eHealth & mHealth.
Biomedical informatics
– Medical information: Types and characteristics of (multimedia) biomedical data.
– The decision making process in medicine – the hypothetico-deductive approach of medical problems.
– Specialized multimedia information systems (medical / video / audio / cardiogram / encephalography, etc.).
– The Electronic Health Record.
– Coding and classification of medical systems and biomedical ontologies.
– Interoperability and related technology standards for (Bio)Medical Informatics.
– Multimedia biomedical information (biomedical signals and medical imaging, and related technology standards).
– Medical knowledge and decision-making systems.
eHealth & mHealth
– Telemedicine / eHealth. mHealth.
– eHealth support technologies (OSGi framework, Universal Plug and Play protocol – UPnP protocol).
– Wireless sensor networks and their application in biomedicine.
– Clinical telemedicine, Tele-radiology, Tele-cardiology, Tele-pathology.
– Systems and services for the prevention or management of chronic diseases. Every semester the course will focus on one of the following: Cardiovascular diseases, Diabetes, Respiratory diseases, Mental disturbances (Depression, bipolar syndrome, stress).
– Services and technologies for the elderly. Every semester the course will focus on one of the following: fall detection, motion estimation, gait and posture estimation.
– Personal Health Record (PHR).
Innovation, the Internet and Entrepreneurship
This course deals with the basic elements for the successful organization of a technological innovation and entrepreneurship. It begins by examining strategies based on innovation as a source of competitive advantage creation and then examines how to build businesses that excel in the tracking, manufacturing and commercialization of technological innovations.
Important issues that will be dealt with in the course include: Introduction to innovation, types of innovations and Entrepreneurship; Process innovation and creativity; Methods innovation and improvement tools; The innovation as an internal strategy of a firm; The contribution of technology to the development of innovation; Open Innovation; Capturing Innovative Business Ideas; Analysis of successful business models for eServices; Criteria for selecting a viable business model; Developing a detailed Business Plan: Development and Evaluation; Understanding the basic economic operation of an undertaking (Break-even analysis, etc.).
Management of ICT Projects
The purpose of this course is enable students to gain fundamental knowledge about modern techniques and methods of successful project management (project organization, project management). By using real cases (case studies), the course presents the basic project management processes with the objective of improving student’s skills in the systematic treatment of the problems encountered during project initiation and design, the staffing of the project, project organization, time scheduling and cost management, and the evaluation of the results of a project (project evaluation).
The course presents the methods and techniques used for the management and evaluation of projects and programs. The course examines the life cycle of a project and the main planning and management processes. We consider the alternative forms of organization for the project management, conflicts and contradictions created during a project implementation and ways to resolve them. It presents the project design and construction process as a network of activities, which constitute the main mechanism for modeling the activities of a project. The temporal resolution of a network of activities is considered in the estimation of the critical path, with the CPM and the PERT methods. The use of mathematical programming techniques is introduced for the estimation of a project’s resource needs and cost.
Finally, modern methodological approaches for planning and management of IT projects are presented.
Technical Terms and Writing
The course aims at developing the students’ skills in understanding the scientific terminology of the science of Information Engineering. An effort will be made to learn the necessary terminology in all its outcomes (listening – speaking – reading – writing). Particular emphasis will be given to obtaining vocabulary and grammar / editorial precision necessary for effective communication in the language. The second part of the course focuses on student learning by writing, editing, and ethical practices in the field of computer science. Emphasis will be placed on the development of know-how regarding the preparation of technical writing.
Writing requires time and effort. Students should be prepared to devote the necessary time and make the necessary effort in this direction. After completing this course, students should be able to
- Read and understand texts, books and scientific articles relative to their specialty.
- Undertake and carry out projects within the context of their studies.
- Understand the relevant foreign bibliography that is part of their studies (especially for their dissertation).
Graduate Courses
Research methods and Project Management
The first section pertains to knowledge relating to understanding the research process in Informatics and Multimedia. The second section covers existing methodological approaches and the design of research (formal methodologies using statistical techniques, qualitative methodologies such as field studies, ethnography, etc). A specific section is devoted to the topic of design science on information system research. The third section discusses techniques for undertaking research in specific topics – mainly through focused presentation of the research lines of the various laboratories. Finally, since research is a process in which a variety of methodologies are employed, in the third part of the course the emphasis will be on issues related to the Management of the Research process. Hence emphasis will be given on understanding key concepts and methodologies of successful project management. By the conclusion of the specified learning activities, participants of this course will demonstrate their ability to:
- Understand the process of scientific research (the scientific process).
- Differentiate between the different types of research and be able to select the most appropriate for their research task.
- Choose sources of information appropriate for the type of research being conducted.
- Advise others of the situations in which participant observation, conversation analysis, documentary analysis, focus groups, interviews & questionnaires, respectively, are appropriate.
- Produce effective reports, adhering to conventional styles, presenting evidence from the data, & exploiting visual representations.
- Make research proposals, taking pertinent factors into account.
- Understand key concepts of successful Project Management.
- Identify appropriate roles in research project management & produce realistic costing.