I am an Ambizione Fellow funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and hold the position of Scientific Collaborator at the Faculty of Informatics, Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) in Switzerland. My primary research focus is on Artificial Intelligence (AI), specifically in the areas of machine learning, federated learning, and explainable AI (XAI). I apply these concepts to various domains such as wearable computing, affective computing, and digital healthcare.

During the Autumn semester of 2024/25, I will be teaching the course on Mobile and Wearable Computing for MSc and PhD students at USI as a replacement lecturer for Professor Silvia Santini during her sabbatical.

Prior to this, I was a postdoctoral researcher at the People-Centered Computing Lab, a research group headed by Professors Marc Langheinrich and Silvia Santini at USI. I earned my PhD in Computer Science from the Jozef Stefan Institute in Slovenia under the supervision of Professors Matjaz Gams and Mitja Lustrek. My thesis was recognized with the prestigious “Jožef Stefan golden emblem,” indicating an outstanding PhD thesis in Slovenia. In 2021, I was honored to be included in the “list of the top 2% scientists in the world,” in the category “single year impact – 2021”. As of 2023, I serve as an Associate Editor at IMWUT (ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies); and as a Board Member at the Global SNSF Fellows Network.

Teaching activities.

Available student projects.

Funding

XAI-PAC: Towards Explainable and Private Affective Computing
Source: Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
Duration: 2024-2028
Role: Primary investigator

SmartCHANGE: AI-based long-term health risk evaluation for driving behaviour change strategies in children and youth
Source: Horizon Europe and SERI (Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation)
Duration: 2024-2028
Role: Scientific collaborator

TRUST-ME: TRUstworthy enhancement of job SaTisfaction and productivity using Micro-sensing in work Environments
Source: Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
Duration: 2024-2027
Role: Scientific collaborator

Education

PhD in Information and Communication Technologies (2016-20)
Jožef Stefan International Postgraduate School, Ljubljana, Slovenia
PhD thesis title: “A fusion of classical and deep machine learning for mobile health and behavior monitoring with wearable sensors” link

M.Sc. in Information and Communication Technologies (2014-16)
Jožef Stefan International Postgraduate School, Ljubljana, Slovenia
M.Sc. thesis title: “Continuous stress monitoring using wrist device and smartphone” link

B.Sc. in Computer Science and Engineering (2010-14)
Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering, Ss. Cyril and Methodius, Skopje, Macedonia
B.Sc. thesis title: “Emotion Classification by Using Features Extracted from Speech” link

Publications

Full list available on Google Scholar

Datasets

Labeled datasets for cognitive-load and stress monitoring with wearable device