Associate Prof. NikolaosPloskas: (Optimization, MathematicalProgramming, Algorithms, Scientific Computing, Machine Learning). He holdsa B.Sc. (2007), M.Sc. (2009), and Ph.D. (2014) from the Department of Applied Informatics of the University of Macedonia. From February 2015 to June 2017, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Advanced Process Decision-Making at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, participating in research projects funded by private companies (Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories and SABIC). In October 2018, he was elected as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the University of Western Macedonia, where he currently serves as an Associate Professor.

His research interests include the development of efficient optimization and machine learning algorithms. He has published numerous scientific articles in various leading journals and conferences in the field (e.g., Mathematical Programming & Computation, Journal of Global Optimization, Optimization Methods & Software, Optimization, Applied Mathematics & Computation, Journal of Systems & Software, Journal of Computational Science, Fuzzy Sets & Systems, CPAIOR, ISMP, EURO, INFORMS, EUROPT, ICCOPT). More specifically, he has published 3 books, 11 chapters in collective volumes, 24 articles in scientific journals and over 80 publications in Greek and international scientific conferences. He is a member of the editorial board of 3 scientific journals. He has participated as a member of the organizing committee / program committee of 30 international scientific conferences. He has participated/is participating in more than 25 projects, as a member of the research team, and in 4 as a coordinator. He has been awarded the prize for the best doctoral thesis in Operational Research (Hellenic Society for Operational Research). He is a member of INFORMS Computing Society, SIAG/CSE, SIAG/OPT, ACM SIGACT, ASM SIGHPC, EUROPT and EWG-DSS scientific societies.