Research in our group

Advances in digital IC technology are spawning a ‘digital revolution’ in the field of signal processing. These days, almost any real-world signal is represented, processed and transported digitally, from physiological vital signs via camera pictures; voice, audio, video and radio signals; to the massive 4-dimensional data sets produced by modern medical imaging equipment.

Our group helps to fuel this revolution through research on the fundamentals of signal processing and information theory, and through application-oriented research on efficient signal- and image processing algorithms, architectures, and systems.

Expertise

Our expertise broadly covers the signal processing field:

• Fundamental expertise:

  Information theory, signal transforms and filter banks, signal processing for communications, adaptive array signal processing, Bayesian machine learning.

• Parametric signal processing:

  Construction of simple parametric models that describe physical signal sources and sensors (e.g. communication-channel models, pathophysiological models), and parametric signal processing approaches that exploit these models.

• Efficiency:

  Signal-processing algorithms, architectures and systems that combine high performance with low complexity while meeting important practical (e.g. latency) constraints. This sometimes involves optimization across the analog/digital borderline, accounting for the relative strengths and limitations of analog and digital IC technology.

• Application-oriented expertise:

  In areas such as audio and video, wireless communication, surveillance, and medical signal and image processing. This expertise is continuously strengthened by a broad research staff, comprising 10 full professors, 5 associate professors, 3 assistant professors, some 10 PostDocs, and around 50 PhD and PDEng students. Research excellence and impact

A core ambition of the group is to combine academic excellence with a strong real-world impact.

To this end many of our graduate, PDENg, PhD and PostDoctoral research projects are co-supervised by senior staff members jointly with top experts from the Eindhoven innovation ecosystem. Around 10 of these experts have a part-time position in our group (mostly at the level of full professor).

Some proof points:

• We currently have 5 IEEE Fellows (Ronald Aarts, Martin Bastiaans, Jean-Paul Linnartz, Frans Willems, Peter de With). Their expertise areas range from network information theory and security with noisy data to audio and video analysis.

• Four of our junior staff members have recently received prestigious personal grants: Tanya Ignatenko (MEERVOUD, biometric privacy and security), Chiara Rabotti and Rik Vullings (VENI, perinatal signal processing), and Massimo Mischi (VIDI and ERC Starting grant, ultrasonographic prostate cancer detection)
• Our group produces around 30 international journal publications each year. Many of these are widely cited. Since 2000 we have spawned 8 spin-out companies (MEDECS, CED, MEDSIM, ViNotion, IPhion, NEMO Healthcare, HiPerMotion, CIBO decision support systems), primarily in the medical and video analysis fields.
• Many of our research results are patented and/or used in industry and/or clinical practice.
• We have consistently received top ratings in the latest national research reviews of all EE groups in The Netherlands (1990-2004 and 2005-2010).

Our facilities include a Biomedical Instrumentation Laboratory, a video laboratory, an acoustic laboratory, and an activity laboratory (dedicated, as well as integrated in our office environment). Also, we routinely use the experimental facilities of strategic research partners (e.g. Philips Research, NXP, Catherina Hospital, Maxima Medical Center, Kempenhaeghe) in joint research endeavors.