CV/

Frederico J.J.B. Santos — PhD candidate at the University of Trieste, using methods from evolutionary computation to design a GPU-native PyTorch framework for neuroevolution. Five peer-reviewed publications, including a Q1 journal article in Applied Soft Computing and papers at CORE A conferences (GECCO, EuroGP, EvoApplications).

Trieste, Italy · [email protected] · ORCID 0000-0003-3589-7877

Education

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2024─now PhD in Artificial Intelligence

University of Trieste, Italy

GPU-native PyTorch framework for neuroevolution · GP-evolved PSO velocity rules

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2020─2023 MSc in Data Science & Advanced Analytics

NOVA Information Management School, Portugal

GPA 18/20 · thesis adapted for publication in Applied Soft Computing

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earlier BSc in Management & Business Administration

Católica Lisbon School of Business & Economics, Portugal

Experience

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2025─now Research & Data Mining

RADAR-AIM, Erasmus+ Cooperation Partnership

Lead WP2 of an EU programme on AI for sustainability — scraped & curated a 300+ course dataset, designed an AI-integration taxonomy, ran keyword-based classification.

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2023─2024 Data Science Research Intern

CrowdSec

Built a PyTorch research framework for real-time malicious-HTTP detection; benchmarked fastText, RoBERTa and Random Forest classifiers; shipped a CLI for training, evaluation and ONNX export.

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2023 Machine Learning Consultant

A400 — Structural Engineering

Designed an algorithm that automated 90% of rebar layout placement, cutting per-region engineer time from ~20 minutes to under one.

Publications

  1. NEVO-GSPT: Population-Based Neural Network Evolution Using Inflate and Deflate Operators D. Farinati, F.J.J.B. Santos, L. Vanneschi, M. Castelli EuroGP 2026 · 2026
  2. Combining Grammatical Evolution with LLM-based Local Search to Improve Interpretability B. Sakallioglu, F.J.J.B. Santos, D. Parra, Y. Qiu, M. Nicolau, L. Trujillo, J.I. Hidalgo EvoApplications 2026 · Best Poster Runner-Up · 2026
  3. Visualizing the Semantic Space Exploration of Ensemble Methods F.J.J.B. Santos, J. Muñoz Contreras, B. Sakallioglu, D. Melendez, A. Tonda, L. Trujillo GECCO 2026 · 2026
  4. Learning the Particle Swarm Optimization Velocity Update via Genetic Programming F.J.J.B. Santos, A. De Lorenzo, L. Manzoni, G. Pietropolli GECCO 2025 · 2025
  5. Neuroevolution with Box Mutation: An Adaptive and Modular Framework for Evolving Deep Neural Networks F.J.J.B. Santos, I. Gonçalves, M. Castelli Applied Soft Computing (Q1) · 2023

Awards & Service

  • ├── EvoApplications 2026 — Best Poster Runner-Up (co-author)
  • ├── SPECIES Summer School on Evolutionary Computation, Moraira, Spain · 2025
  • └── Conference Volunteer · EvoStar 2025 & Ital-IA 2025, Trieste

Languages

  • ├── Portuguese — native
  • ├── English — fluent
  • └── Italian — A1