Hello, world!

I am a fourth-year Ph.D. Candidate in Computer Science at KU Leuven, under the esteemed guidance of Prof. Marie-Francine Moens. My intellectual pursuits orbit at the captivating confluence of Natural Language Processing, Information Extraction, Deep Learning, and the fascinating world of Continual Learning.

In my current academic journey, I spearhead the creation of an end‑to‑end open‑source knowledge extraction system from the ground up. This endeavor, meticulously architected around the expert-in-the-loop paradigm, seamlessly aligns with the tenets of lifelong learning. Recognizing the challenge of navigating vast volumes of research text daily, my unwavering focus has centered on the realm of biomedical text. Within this domain, I've embarked on a mission with far-reaching implications by tackling the intricate complexities of two formidable yet unresolved diseases: Alzheimer's disease, encompassing a staggering trove of over 500,000 PubMed papers, and Rett syndrome, spanning a comprehensive collection of more than 4,000 PubMed papers.

However, my aspirations don't stop at disease comprehension through seamless knowledge extraction. My research gaze extends to the frontier of personalized medicine, where I harness the potential of person-centric knowledge graphs to decode the enigmatic progression of ALS disease. My ambition lies in bridging the gap between cutting-edge medical insights and the noble endeavor of personalized patient care, creating a synergy that holds the promise of transforming lives.

A notable accomplishment that adorns my research journey is the creation of a contrastive learning framework, ingeniously integrating both graph and text modalities to instill relation-oriented structure into Language Models like BERT and RoBERTa. This novel approach has empowered me to transcend the constraints of traditional text encoders, ushering in a new era of possibilities. By translating the acquired embedding spaces into tangible solutions, I've ventured into the realms of relation extraction and named entity recognition, solving these intricate tasks using deceptively simple yet effective classifiers like KNN.

Beyond academia, my expedition led me to the vanguard of innovation as a research scientist intern at IBM Research. Here, I had the privilege of immersing myself in projects that not only stoked the flames of my curiosity but also enriched my repertoire of skills. A significant chapter in this journey involved insights from Electronic Health Records (EHR) to construct person-centric knowledge graphs. This endeavor saw me wield the power of the HSPO ontology and harness the prowess of Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) to tackle the formidable task of predicting intensive care unit readmissions. Embracing the spirit of versatility, my explorations expanded to encompass the fascinating domain of embedding learning for heterogeneous graphs. These explorations are on the brink of yielding results in the shape of upcoming research publications. The team's influence also extends into the realm of open-source collaboration. I've been instrumental in fortifying IBM's commitment to knowledge dissemination, playing a pivotal role in bolstering their open-source initiative, exemplified by the repository. In a testament to my innovation, and inventiveness, I proudly stand as the primary inventor in a patent filing.

In my earlier ventures, I've delved into a diverse array of research domains. One path led me to the intricacies of denoising resting-state fMRI scans through the application of deep learning techniques. Another trail took me into the realm of gaze localization and eye-tracking during driving, where I sought to unravel the mysteries of human attention and behavior on the road. Additionally, I immersed myself in the captivating world of human emotion recognition from conversational video data, uncovering the nuanced interplay of emotions in dynamic interactions.

As for my roots, I hail from Tripolis, the capital of Arcadia, steeped in history and surrounded by breathtaking beauty. My formative years were then shaped in Athens, where seven years of studying, working, and immersing myself in the city's energy left an indelible mark. Today, I'm nestled in Brussels, a cosmopolitan hub pulsating at the heart of Europe, characterized by its multicultural essence and lively spirit.

For deeper insights into my journey and potential collaborations, I invite you to explore my CV or reach out to me directly. And if the allure of Greece beckons, I stand ready to offer recommendations. Here's to embracing the journey of knowledge, discovery, and shared experiences!