This research area concentrates on technology aiming to augment human capabilities and assist them in everyday activities. We address this goal by studying, e.g., methods for computational design, speech interaction, audiovisual headsets, spatial sound, and wearable computing. Our research teams study human perception to create better algorithms to model and simulate human behavior. Our research is seeking sustainable solutions for global grand challenges.

Human-centric technology consists of three major research areas: Acoustics and Audio Technology, Speech and Language Technology and Interactive Systems / pervasive computing.

Application areas include AI-optimised user interfaces, AR/VR technology, spatial sound capturing and rendering, audio and music processing, as well as automatic speech recognition, understanding, and production, not to forget speech privacy. 

Teaching

We contribute to teaching in the following Aalto University majors:

Two Bachelor's majors:

•   Information Technology (in Finnish)

•   Engineering Psychology (in Finnish)

Five majors in the Computer, Communication and Information Sciences Master's Programme:

• Acoustics and Audio Technology
• Speech and Language Technology
• Communications Engineering
• Human-Computer Interaction
• Signal Processing and Data Science

Research groups 

Our research supports solving societal grand challenges and our work supports several UN sustainable development goals. We are particularly active in areas of sustainable ICT, resilience and cyber-security, ‘industry & innovation & infrastructure solutions’, and ‘equal & universal access’ towards high-speed connectivity. The unifying theme in the research area is taking a broad perspective on communications architectures and systems. The research area takes particular pride in that we also deploy and develop hardware and software implementations.

Our research has contributed to all major generations of cellular communication systems, Wi-Fi development, wireless internet, IoT, and sensor networking. There are several successful spin-offs that have originated from the research area. Our practical impact is also shown by numerous contributions to standardisation, e.g. in IETF, 3GPP and ISO. Members of our research area are also sought out experts in regulatory and policy affairs.

We approach the problem domain in a multi-disciplinary fashion employing experimentation, testbeds, simulations, and theory. Our research aims to develop and validate overall systems so that our solutions can be eventually deployed to real systems so that they generate maximum impact. The research groups working in the research area cover all protocol stack levels, including prior ground-breaking work on Physical Layer, Media Access, and Internet Scale Technologies.

Teaching

We contribute to teaching in the following majors of the Master's Programme in Computer, Communication and Information Sciences:

• Communications Engineering
• Machine Learning, Data Science and Artificial Intelligence

Research groups

Our research has contributed to the specifications of several generations of wireless communication systems. Our students find research and development positions in industry, work as experts and researchers in the public sector and in research centers, pursue a career in academia, or join startups. We have extensive international research collaboration among world-leading research universities and institutes.

We focus on fundamental methods in adaptive systems, communication theory, detection and estimation theory, measurement science and technology, networks theory, and signal processing supported by the fields of data science, discrete mathematics, information theory, machine learning and optimisation theory.

The applications cover all kinds of wireless systems, transmitting and receiving, from the physical layer to the data link layer, and our research is also applied to develop novel network architectures and energy-efficient solutions. Estimation of reliability and uncertainty of measurement results play an essential role in applications. Moreover, we focus on sensor systems where the physical world and information meet, including radars, large-scale sensor networks, and the internet of things.

Teaching

We contribute to teaching in the following majors of the Master's Programme in Computer, Communication and Information Sciences:

• Communications Engineering
• Signal Processing and Data Science 
• Machine Learning, Data Science and Artificial Intelligence

Within information and communication theory, we work on, e.g. design of error-correcting codes, random matrices, multiuser multi-antenna systems, interference management, physical layer security, caching and resource allocations in wireless systems and vehicular networks, wireless networked control systems, non-terrestrial networks, flexible spectrum use, resource allocation, and optimisation algorithms.

In signal processing, we work on multiantenna and multisensor systems, transceiver algorithms, advanced radar, distributed sensing and sensor networks, integrated sensing and communications, intelligent reflective surfaces, visible light communications, defense, and security applications, localisation, cyber-physical systems, biosignal processing, biomedical imaging, sensor data fusion, statistical learning and inference, estimation and detection algorithms, advanced optimisation methods, ML/AI-based signal processing and control algorithms and machine learning for radio frequencies.

In measurement science and technology, we work in improving the reliability of measurement results, especially related to characterisation of light source properties, of light detector sensitivities, and of optical properties materials.

Research groups