Centre for Data and Complex Systems Research

Director: Professor Nik Bessis

Deputy Director: Professor Yannis Korkontzelos

The research centre has been formed to support the development of an environment of international excellence in the areas of computer and data science with a particular emphasis on smart data analytics, data representation and visualisation, cyber security, interoperable and interconnected distributed applications and technologies and smart infrastructures, AI and autonomous robotics, telecommunications, IoTs and other disruptive services and technologies.

The research centre is structured into five high-level research groupings:

The Smart Data Analytics Research Group focuses on core and applied aspects of Data Analytics, Data Science and Machine Learning.

Overview

The Smart Data Analytics Research Group aims to promote and shape research relevant to the theory and practice of methods and tools for data collection, enrichment, processing and storage. It focuses on developing application-driven methods, algorithms and protocols that enable efficient collection, transfer and curation of images, videos, text, time series, data streams and other types of unstructured or semi-structured data.

The Group has expertise on a multitude of fields in the broad research areas of Machine Learning, Data Mining, Natural Language Processing, Social Media mining, Optimisation algorithms, Metaheuristics and AI Ethics. The Group’s research activity is inherently interdisciplinary. Application domains of current interest include medicine & healthcare, psychology, software analysis, astronomy, physics and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for geography.

Research areas:

Real-time machine learning
Resource-efficient machine learning
Classification Imbalance
- outlier detection
- novelty detection (novel classes in dynamically-changing data)
- one-class learning
Big data
Data mining, pattern recognition & semantic analysis
Natural Language Processing and Text Mining
Social Media mining
Metaheuristic Algorithms (single & multi-objective)
Soft Computing Methods
Search and Optimization Algorithms
Grammar Induction, Inference and Domain Specific Languages
Feature design and analysis
AI Ethics

Members

Professor Yannis Korkontzelos (Group Leader)
Dr Robert Lyon (Group co-leader)
Dr Nonso Nnamoko
Dr Hari Pandey
Professor Marcello Trovati
Dr Huaizhong Zhang
Babatunde Onikoyi (PhD student, Graduate Teaching Assistant)

Exemplar projects

Our research group has attracted over £1M of external funding from several sources, such as InnovateUK and European Commission Horizon 2020.

MRes/PhD research

Members of the group are supervising and have supervised many MRes and PhD students on research projects related to the research and application areas mentioned above. Members are always interested in supervising new PhD students.

To discuss potential PhD topics under Smart Data Analytics, please contact Professor Yannis Korkontzelos. For other enquiries related to PhD admissions, please contact Professor Ella Pereira, Director of Research.

Research focus and activities

The focus of our group is on developing novel autonomous and smart systems, capable of collating, communicating, and computing information streams. The new paradigm of hybrid, complex and intelligent systems are expected to provide solutions to many health, industry and automation challenges, thus improving quality of life and wellbeing. However, developing interconnected/distributed systems have become increasingly complex and require expertise in the key enabling technologies such as Internet of Things (IoT), fog, cloud and AI.

Our group members with expertise in the areas of Distributed Systems, Distributed Middleware, Cloud computing, IoT and IoT enabled smart systems, applied AI/ML/Deep Learning, ontologies, semantic web and biometrics share interest in addressing challenges posed by the complexity of delivering highly reliable and dependable technological innovations and smart solutions. We carry out both fundamental and applied research.

With the strong focus on applications for digital health and industry 4.0 and its system based approach, the group compliments and synergise with the work carried out by colleagues from other research groupings within the department, such as smart analytics, computer vision and those from engineering disciplines. We believe that complexity involved in developing and delivering smart applications very often requires interdisciplinary approach to research and problem solving. To support of our interdisciplinary activities, internally, we are working with the Health Research Institute. Externally, we have established collaborations with industry, NHS, academic partners, stakeholders and research users.

Research areas

Fog/Edge/Cloud computing
Distributed systems
Applied AI/Machine Learning
Internet of Things (IoT)
Body/Sensor Networks
Ontology and semantics technologies
Digital health
Healthcare applications
Distributed Application/Systems development
Multimedia Networks
Mobile Applications – Mobile Healthcare
Future Internet – IoT
Industry 4.0
Cyber Physical Systems
Smart Cities
Autonomous transportation systems
Digital Twins
Environmental/climate-change/Disaster management systems

Members

Professor Ella Pereira (Group Leader)
Dr Muhammad Awais (Co-leader)
Professor Nik Bessis
Professor Marcello Trovati
Dr Nonso Nnamoko
Dr Sarah McHale
Dr Peter Matthew
Dr Huazhong Zhang
Dr Mohzin Raza
Dr Xutao Deng
Wilson Costa (PhD student, Graduate Teaching Assistant)
Hezekiah Samwini (PhD student, Graduate Teaching Assistant)

Current projects

Our research group has attracted close to £1M of external funding from several sources, such as InnovateUK, EPSRC and the Department for Education.

KTPs with Country Range Group LTD and BEC Integration LTD

MRes/PhD research

The group members have extended experience of supervising MRes and PhD studies and welcomes proposals on the topics related to the groups research activities and interests, above.

For any PhD or other enquiries please contact Professor Ella Pereira, Director of Research.

The Cyber Security Research group is committed to carry out internationally recognized, high-quality research on security and privacy in computer systems and networks. We collaborate with academic and industrial partners in the UK and worldwide in different research and knowledge transfer projects. The research activities of the group focus on designing and evaluating secure and privacy friendly systems, networks, and applications, by proposing novel approaches in these areas. Several of our publications appeared in reputed journals and conferences.  Along with the research activities, we teach several modules in undergraduate and postgraduate security programmes at Edge Hill University.

Research areas

Blockchain based security and privacy enhancing technologies and applications

The concept of enterprise and permissioned blockchains opens many opportunities to design and develop decentralised applications to provide higher degree of data control and transparency for the users. Another advantage is that smart contracts can be used to automate security verification and notification in enterprise environments. We investigate the application of this decentralised concept, and design new applications such as distributed collaborative intrusion detection systems (IDSs), and decentralised data protection mandate enforcement engines.

Security and privacy by design

System design goes through several stages before it is finally followed by implementation and production. It is crucial that any flaw in the design is recognised and fixed at the early stage to avoid production and implementation delay and additional cost. Our research covers different areas of system design, including threat and risk assessment, user-centred design and fully automated or computer aided security and privacy verification methods.

Security and privacy problems of Internet of Things and smart services and applications.

Internet of Things (IoT) applications help making our life more convenient and safer, and enable smart city, smart homes, or smart health-care initiatives worldwide.
Potential design flaws in these applications and services pose high security and privacy risks to the system users. To prevent this, we design and evaluate secure and privacy friendly approaches for IoT applications and developing testbeds for performance evaluations.

Security and privacy problems of biometrics systems and applications.

Biometrics systems are broadly used for authentication purposes. However, applying them correctly as part of a complex security system is not trivial. Incorrect application or installation can pose security and privacy risks and violate data protection mandates. We focus on designing and developing approaches and algorithms to improve the effectiveness of biometrics authentication, and model different types of biometric systems to evaluate their security and privacy properties based on mathematical methods.

Members

Dr Vinh-Thong Ta (Group Leader)
Dr Mark Liptrott
Dr Peter Matthew
Dr Muhammad Usman
Dr Sarah McHale
Dr Nonso Nnamoko
Professor Marcello Trovati

Current projects

Our research group has attracted approximately £250K of external funding from several sources, such as Higher Education Academy and the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

Cyber Security Student Club

The Cyber Security Student Club gathers talented students who expressed strong interest in the field of cyber security. Core members meet to expand their knowledge by discussing and solving practical exercises and problems in system and network security, to socialize, and in general, to have fun with others of similar interest. Members also prepare for Capture the Flag (CTF) competitions and creating practical ethical hacking exercises.

If you are interested in joining the club, please contact Dr Vinh-Thong Ta. Note: The club is only open for students of the Computer Science Department at Edge Hill university.

MRes/PhD research

Members of the group are supervising and have supervised many MRes and PhD students on research projects related to the research and application areas, above. Members are always interested in supervising new PhD students.

To discuss potential PhD topics under Cyber Security, please contact Dr Vinh-Thong Ta. For other enquiries related to PhD admissions, please contact Prof Ella Pereira, Director of Research.