Professor  Athena Vakali

Athena Vakali is a professor at the School of Informatics, Aristotle University, Greece, where she leads the Laboratory on Data and Web science (Datalab https://datalab.csd.auth.gr/ ). She holds a PhD degree in Informatics (Aristotle University), a MSc degree in Computer Science (Purdue University, USA), and BSc degree in Mathematics . 

 

Her current research interests include Data Science topics with emphasis on big data mining and analytics, Next generation Internet applications and enablers, online social networks mining, as well as on online sources data management on the cloud, the egde and decentralized settings. She has supervised 10 completed PhD theses and she has been awarded for her educational and research work which is extended with mentoring and students empowerment (ACM, ACMW). 

 

Prof. Vakali has published over than 160 papers in refereed journals and Conferences and she is in the editorial board of the "Computers & Electrical Engineering" Journal, and ICST Transactions on Social Informatics (her publications received over 8060 citations with hindex=37 according to gscholar). 

 

She has coordinated and participated in more than 25 research projects in EU FP7, H2020, international and national projects. She has served as a member in the EU Steering Committee for the Future Internet Assembly (2012-14) and she has been appointed as Director of the Graduate Program in Informatics, Aristotle University (2014-15). She has co-chaired major Conferences Program Committees such as : PC co-chair at the ACM/IEEE Web Intelligence Conference 2019, the EU Network of Excellence 2nd Internet Science Conference (EINS 2015), 15th Web Information Systems Engineering (WISE 2014), and 5th International Conference on Model & Data Engineering (MEDI 2015). She has also served as Workshops co-chair and has been a member to numerous International conferences and Workshops. 

 

She has been an active ACM member with continuous activities such as : 

• Founding Member of the Greek Chapter of the ACM-W (ACM's Council on Women in Computing), active member (since 2018).  

• Member of the ACM/IEEE/WIC Web Intelligence Technical Committee (WI -TC) and WI Conference Steering Committee (since 2019). 

• Mentorship and support for the establishment and promotion of the ACM Aristotle University Student Chapter as the official student chapter of the ACM in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki to be based at the School of Informatics (since 2008)

• Faculty Sponsor, Mentorship and support for the establishment and promotion of the AUTH ACMW Student Chapter as the official chapter of ACM-W at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece (AUTH), based at the School of Informatics (since 2012).