Meet the team
Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS
Ricardo Melo (IR)
Ricardo Melo is a Senior Researcher at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, working on the Human-Centred Design (HCD) team. He is also a Guest Adjunct Professor at ISCAP and Invited Assistant Professor at University of Porto, lecturing on topics such as graphic and communication design, design management, development of digital products, and game design. With a background in communication design and multimedia, he holds a Ph.D. in Design from the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto, for which he was awarded an FCT scholarship to study the value of serendipity in digital interactions. Ricardo is an expert in communication and interaction design, as well as on technology assessment in real-life contexts. At Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS he gives training on these topics to students and professionals and manages projects with a focus on technology assessment, including with non-mainstream audiences.
Diana Liebetrau
Diana Liebetrau is a Junior Researcher at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, working on the Human-Centred Design (HCD) team. She is currently completing her MSc in Information Technology from the University of Cape Town. Before transitioning to research, she held roles in commercial management and entrepreneurship. At Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS she is engaged in research activities focused on usability assessment and user research within healthcare technologies.
Inês Silva
Inês Silva is a Researcher in Interaction Design at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS in the Human-Centred Design department. She holds a Bachelor’s in Computer Engineering Sciences and a master’s in Multimedia, specializing in interactive technologies and digital games, both from the University of Porto. In her thesis, Inês focused on designing a mental well-being self-report interface for shop floor workers. Previously, she worked as a class monitor at FEUP and served on the directorial board of the NCGM association in FEUP, spearheading initiatives centred around game design and user experience. At Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, Inês contributes to various research projects and actively engages in various research activities, focused on enhancing user experience and usability.
Joana Silva
Joana Silva is a Design Researcher working in the Human-Centered Design group at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, with a BA in Communication Design (Higher School of Arts and Design, ESAD Matosinhos) and a specialisation course in Interaction, Web and Game Design (Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto). Previously, she worked as a research fellow at INEGI (Institute of Science and Innovation in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering) and FEUP (Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto), seeking to design a series of eHealth short games for rehabilitation recovery. She is currently pursuing a MA in Image Design (Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto), seeking to co-create design research materials that promote playful and embodied experiences as strategies to support participatory design methods with vulnerable groups around sensitive topics.
Mariana Pereira
Mariana Pereira is a Designer at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, working on the Human-Centred Design (HCD) team. She holds a BA in Communication Design, a BA in Digital Arts and Multimedia, and a postgraduate degree in Motion Design, from Escola Superior de Artes e Design (Matosinhos). She has special interest in digital media, from interface/web design to motion graphics. At Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, Mariana gives design support to R&D projects and to the institutional communication by developing dissemination materials through a wide range of mediums.
Sílvia Rêgo
Sílvia Rêgo is a Clinical Researcher specialist in Health Technology Assessment, particularly of digital health and medical devices. She holds an academic background in Nursing (BSc from Porto Nursing School) and in Evidence and Decision in Health (MSc from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto) and is currently enrolled in the Doctoral Programme in Clinical and Health Services Research at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto. Her current research interests are the clinical validation of digital medical devices, clinical prediction models of disease, and digital endpoints. Working as a scientist at Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, these interests are combined to bring new technologies into clinical practice.
Institute of Philosophy (FLUP)
José Meirinhos (Co-IR)
Celeste Pedro
Celeste Pedro is a communication designer graduated from the Fine Arts Faculty in Porto, Portugal. Her main focuses have since been typography and editorial design. She holds a master’s in Design and Intermedia from the University of Barcelona. Later, she specialised in early printed books and palaeography while conducting her PhD research on the History of Portuguese Print Culture in the Sixteenth Century, funded by FCT. Recently, she was a post-doc researcher for the project "From Data to Wisdom - Philosophizing Data Visualizations in the Middle Ages and Early Modernity (13th-17th c.)" at the Institute of Philosophy of the University of Porto, where she now continues her work on knowledge visualisations (diagrams), and digital ontologies.
Irandina Afonso
Irandina Afonso is a Ph.D. candidate at the Doctoral Program in Philosophy of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Porto (FLUP). She holds a Ph.D. scholarship (DOI 10.54499/UI/BD/150998/2021) from the FCT - Portuguese National Fund for Science, Research and Technology at the RG Philosophy & Public Space of the Instituto de Filosofia (R&D Unit/FIL/00502). Since 2023 she has been an Invited Assistant at the Department of Philosophy of the FLUP. Master's degree (2020) and Degree in Philosophy (2018) at FLUP. Honours Degree in Dentistry (2000) at the Faculty of Dentistry of the University of Porto (FMDUP). Research domains include: contemporary identity politics, contemporary subjectivity, social and political thought, philosophy of the city and public space, non-binary gender studies.
João Rebalde
Leandro Ortolan
Leandro Ortolan has a degree in Philosophy and a Master's student in Philosophy, starting his PHD candidacy in 2024. His research takes place in the areas of artificial intelligence on human behavioral issues, which involve Ethics, Action, Language and the forms of social organizations, but not only, especially with regard to the ontological classifications of all these areas and their interconnections, seeking to consolidate criteria for a meta-ontology that can translate the dynamism of existing relationships; and to aspire to criteria for a possible relational model in which it can serve as a qualitative and quantitative reference for determining instances such as values in design, for example.
Mário Correia
Carnegie Mellon University
Sarah Fox
Cella Sum
Franchesca Spektor
Advisory Board
Alberto Romele
Researcher at the IZEW, the International Center for Ethics in the Sciences of the University of Tuebingen. He has been an associate professor of philosophy at the ETHICS Lab (EA 7446) of Lille Catholic University and assistant professor in contemporary philosophy at the University of Burgundy (Dijon, France), FCT postdoctoral researcher at the University of Porto, and postdoctoral researcher at the Fonds Ricoeur in Paris. His research focuses on philosophy of technology, with a specific interest in digital technologies and technological imaginaries.
Jeannette Pols
Endowed professor in Ethics, Law & Medical humanities at Amsterdam UMC. Pols studied Social Philosophy and Clinical Psychology in Groningen and received her PhD from the University of Twente for an award-winning study in empirical ethics. Since 2006, Pols works with the staff of the section of Medical ethics, Department of General Practice in the Amsterdam Medical Centre. Here, she studied the development of telecare in the Netherlands by ethnographically studying how patients use telecare technologies at home, and nurses in the hospital.
Jaime Snyder
Associate professor in the Information School at the University of Washington. Her research focuses on social aspects of visual practices in the information domain, visual materiality and ethics, and values in the design of visual representations of information. She also serves as Adjunct Assistant Professor in the UW Department of Human-Centered Design and Engineering. Her current research aims to expand the ways that the creation and use of visual information are understood and supported.
Luísa Ribas
Assistant professor at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon where she teaches Communication Design with a focus on the complementarity between print and digital media. Her research is devoted to the study of computational systems as aesthetic artefacts, their design and experience, focusing on interactivity and audiovisuality. She is currently a member of CIEBA, Center for Research and Studies in Fine Arts, and a collaborator of ID +, Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture.