Andrea Varsavsky

I was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina on April 21st 1979 and migrated to Australia in December 1989. I was trained as an Electrical Engineer and Computer Scientist at The University of Melbourne, Australia, and graduated in 2001 with first class honours, and later on completed a PhD in biomedical engineering. My experience is broad and spans development, research and teaching. In 2002-2004 I was employed as a computer engineer by Softronics Pty. Ltd. My role specifically involved design, management and development of DSP related technologies. I have a strong interest in education and I have been actively involved in tertiary level teaching since 1999. I am currently employed as a research engineer in the Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. My PhD research focused on the specific problem of epileptic seizure detection and prediction. The central achievements include: » An independent broad review of detection algorithms. This is the first performed on a common dataset. Its principal aim is to provide benchmarks for future tests. » A novel strategy for seizure detection is developed based on information theoretic entropy. » The applicability of seizure prediction based on macro-scopic EEG records is studied. It is concluded that the memory inherent in epileptic episodes is too long and the un-stationary nature of EEG makes it unsuitable for prediction. My thesis aims to be both informative and objective by challenging the status quo where necessary. I am a published member of the IEEE, with more publications on the way. In my current research I have moved on to developing innovative strategies to improve the hearing of cochlear implant and hearing aid users.