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Dr Amel Bennaceur

Amel Bennaceur

Profile summary

Professional biography

I am an academic and Software Engineering Researcher with 12+ year experience doing research and development to make adaptive and intelligent systems trustworthy and assure their quality and resilience.

Driven by some burning intellectual curiosity, I love research and experimenting with novel ideas. I am an engineer at heart and I like building things and getting my hands dirty. I have strong math, logic, and problem solving foundation, which I believe is essential to develop good software. I believe that my success can only be complete through the success of others. Rather than getting the most out of everyone, I strive to lead with kindness and inclusivity to bring the best of everyone.

I published 30+ papers in top journals and conferences (TSE, ISWC, Middleware, RE, ECSA) in research areas such as Software Engineering and Distributed Systems. I'm also an investigator in a number of EU and National/EPSRC research projects.

Programming Languages: Java, Python, Matlab, Prolog
Tools and Libraries: Model Checkers (LTSA, CADP), Machine Learning (TensorFlow, PyTorch, Bonsai Deep Reinforcement Learning), Angular2, OWL Semantic Reasoning, Choco Constraint Solving
Frameworks: AWS, Kubernetes, Docker
Web Development: Django, React, Bootstrap, Material Design, Photoshop

Externally funded projects

REsilient Autonomous SOcio-cyber-physical ageNts
RoleStart dateEnd dateFunding source
Co-investigator01 Nov 202031 Oct 2024EPSRC Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

REASON will develop a comprehensive toolbox of general principles, mathematically based notations and models, reasoning methods, and systematic approaches enabling autonomous systems to operate with unprecedented levels of resilience. Analogous to the adaptive toolbox widely hypothesised to underpin human decision-making under uncertainty,17 our REASONing toolbox will allow autonomous systems to decide and perform resilience-enhancing actions safely, securely and observant of relevant social, legal, ethical, empathy and cultural rules and norms. Using the REASONinig toolbox, autonomous systems will proactively quantify and reduce uncertainty, predict and preempt disruptions, seek assistance from and co-operate with humans and peer autonomous systems, and provide assurances to instil stakeholder trust. The REASON vision will be delivered by a team of Computer Scientists ( CS ), Engineers ( Eng ), sychologists ( Psy ), Philosophers ( Phil ), Lawyers ( Law ), and Mathematicians (Math) with an extensive track record of leading large research programmes and of delivering research in all areas of the project.

COVID-19: Supporting social and emotional resilience for lonely populations (SERVICE)
RoleStart dateEnd dateFunding source
Co-investigator01 Aug 202031 Mar 2022EPSRC Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

The STRETCH team at the Open University, University of Exeter, and Nottingham Trent University are proposing to develop a novel multi-platform digital intervention addressing isolation and loneliness of older adults exacerbated by the COVID-19 crisis. This app facilitates a) expression and logging emotions to increase feelings of control, b) visualization and analysis of personal support networks to increase resilience, c) enabling individuals to communicate their emotions and feelings of loneliness with family and friends to provide a reliable source of emotional support, d) analysis of these data to offer personalized insights. We expect this app to have concrete benefits on feelings of loneliness, social efficacy and security which in turn will have measurable long-term health benefits.

SAUSE: Secure, Adaptive, Usable Software Engineering
RoleStart dateEnd dateFunding source
Co-investigator01 Apr 201831 Mar 2024EPSRC Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

In the last decade, the role of software engineering has changed rapidly and radically. Globalisation and mobility of people and services, pervasive computing, and ubiquitous connectivity through the Internet have disrupted traditional software engineering boundaries and practices. People and services are no longer bound by physical locations. Computational devices are no longer bound to the devices that host them. Communication, in its broadest sense, is no longer bounded in time or place. The Software Engineering & Design (SEAD) group at the Open University (OU) is leading software engineering research in this new reality that requires a paradigm shift in the way software is developed and used. This platform grant will grow and sustain strategic, multi-disciplinary, crosscutting research activities that underpin the advances in software engineering required to build the pervasive and ubiquitous computing systems that will be tightly woven into the fabric of a complex and changing socio-technical world. In addition to sustaining and growing the SEAD group at the OU and supporting its continued collaboration with the Social Psychology research group at the University of Exeter, the SAUSE platform will also enable the group to have lasting impact across several application domains such as healthcare, aviation, policing, and sustainability. The grant will allow the team to enhance the existing partner networks in these areas and to develop impact pathways for their research, going beyond the scope and lifetime of individual research projects.

Publications

On Specifying for Trustworthiness (2024-01)
Abeywickrama, Dhaminda B.; Bennaceur, Amel; Chance, Greg; Demiris, Yiannis; Kordoni, Anastasia; Levine, Mark; Moffat, Luke; Moreau, Luc; Mousavi, Mohammad Reza; Nuseibeh, Bashar; Ramamoorthy, Subramanian; Ringert, Jan Oliver; Wilson, James; Windsor, Shane and Eder, Kerstin
Communications of the ACM, 67(1) (pp. 98-109)


Towards a Research Agenda for Understanding and Managing Uncertainty in Self-Adaptive Systems (2023-10-17)
Weyns, Danny; Calinescu, Radu; Mirandola, Raffaela; Tei, Kenji; Acosta, Maribel; Bennaceur, Amel; Boltz, Nicolas; Bureŝ, Tomáš; Cámara, Javier; Diaconescu, Ada; Engels, Gregor; Gerasimou, Simos; Gerostathopoulos, Ilias; Getir Yaman, Sinem; Grassi, Vincenzo; Hahner, Sebastian; Inverardi, Paola; de Lemos, Rogerio; Van Landuyt, Dimitri; Letier, Emmanuel; Litoiu, Marin; Marsso, Lina; Musil, Angelika; Musil, Juergen; Nunes Rodrigues, Genaína; Perez-Palacin, Diego; Quin, Federico; Scandura, Patrizia; Vallecilo, Antonio and Zisman, Andrea
ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, 48(4) (pp. 20-36)


“Are we in this together?” : embedding social identity detection in drones improves emergency coordination (2023-09-07)
Kordoni, Anastasia; Gavidia-Calderon, Carlos; Levine, Mark; Bennaceur, Amel and Nuseibeh, Bashar
Frontiers in Psychology, 14, Article 1146056


Impacts of Heterogeneous Chemistry on Vertical Profiles of Martian Ozone (2022-11-10)
Brown, M. A. J.; Patel, M. R.; Lewis, S. R.; Holmes, J. A.; Sellers, G. J.; Streeter, P. M.; Bennaceur, A.; Liuzzi, G.; Villanueva, G. L. and Vandaele, A. C.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, 127, Article e2022JE007346(11)


Loneliness in older people and COVID-19: Applying the social identity approach to digital intervention design (2022-05)
Stuart, Avelie; Katz, Dmitri; Stevenson, Clifford; Gooch, Daniel; Harkin, Lydia; Bennasar, Mohamed; Sanderson, Lisa; Liddle, Jacki; Bennaceur, Amel and Levine, Mark
Computers in Human Behavior Reports, 6, Article 100179


Designing Tangibles to Support Emotion Logging for Older Adults: Development and Usability Study (2022-04-22)
Gooch, Daniel; Mehta, Vikram; Stuart, Avelie; Katz, Dmitri; Bennasar, Mohamed; Levine, Mark; Bandara, Arosha; Nuseibeh, Bashar; Bennaceur, Amel and Price, Blaine
JMIR Human Factors, 9, Article e34606(2)


Feature-driven Mediator Synthesis: Supporting Collaborative Security in the Internet of Things (2018-07-18)
Bennaceur, Amel; Tun, Thein Than; Bandara, Arosha K.; Yu, Yijun and Nuseibeh, Bashar
ACM Transactions on Cyber-Physical Systems, 2, Article 21(3)


A unifying perspective on protocol mediation: interoperability in the Future Internet (2015-06-13)
Bennaceur, Amel; Andriescu, Emil; Speicys Cardoso, Roberto and Issarny, Valérie
Journal of Internet Services and Applications, 6, Article 12


Automated synthesis of mediators to support component interoperability (2015-03-18)
Bennaceur, Amel and Issarny, Valérie
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, 41(3) (pp. 221-240)


The role of models@run.time in supporting on-the-fly interoperability (2013-03-01)
Bencomo, N.; Bennaceur, A.; Grace, P.; Blair, G. and Issarny, V.
Computing, 95(3) (pp. 167-190)


Requirements Engineering (2019-02-25)
Bennaceur, Amel; Tun, Thein Than; Yu, Yijun and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In: Cha, Sungdeok (Steve); Taylor, Richard N. and Kang, Kyo C. eds. Handbook of Software Engineering (pp. 51-92)
ISBN : 978-3-030-00261-9 | Publisher : Springer


The Many Facets of Mediation: A Requirements-driven Approach for Trading-off Mediation Solutions (2016-08-11)
Bennaceur, A. and Nuseibeh, B.
In: Mistrík, Ivan; Ali, Nour; Kazman, Rick; Grundy, John and Schmerl, Bradley eds. Managing Trade-offs in Adaptable Software Architectures (pp. 299-322)
ISBN : 9780128028551 | Publisher : Elsevier


Mechanisms for leveraging models at runtime in self-adaptive software (2014)
Bennaceur, Amel; France, Robert B.; Tamburrelli, Giordano; Vogel, Thomas; Mosterman, Pieter J.; Cazzola, Walter; Costa, Fábio M.; Pierantonio, Alfonso; Tichy, Matthias; Akşit, Mehmet; Emmanuelson, Pär; Gang, Huang; Georgantas, Nikolaos and Redlich, David
In: Bencomo, Nelly; France, Robert B.; Cheng, Betty H. and Assmann, Uwe eds. Models@run.time: Foundations, Applications, and Roadmaps. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (8378) (pp. 19-46)
ISBN : 978-3-319-08914-0 | Publisher : Springer | Published : Cham


Composing distributed systems: overcoming the interoperability challenge (2013)
Issarny, Valérie and Bennaceur, Amel
In: Elena, Giachino; Reiner, Hähnle; Frank, de Boer and Marcello, Bosangue eds. Formal Methods for Components and Objects. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (7866) (pp. 168-196)
ISBN : 978-3-642-40614-0 | Publisher : Springer | Published : Berlin


Middleware-layer connector synthesis: beyond state of the art in middleware interoperability (2011)
Issarny, Valérie; Bennaceur, Amel and Bromberg, Yérom-David
In: Bernardo, Marco and Issarny, Valérie eds. Formal Methods for Eternal Networked Software Systems: 11th International School on Formal Methods for the Design of Computer, Communication and Software Systems, SFM 2011, Bertinoro, Italy, June 13-18, 2011. Advanced Lectures. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (6659) (pp. 217-255)
ISBN : 978-3-642-21454-7 | Publisher : Springer | Published : Berlin Heidelberg


The CONNECT architecture (2011)
Grace, Paul; Georgantas, Nikolaos; Bennaceur, Amel; Blair, Gordon S.; Chauvel, Franck; Issarny, Valérie; Paolucci, Massimo; Saadi, Rachid; Souville, Betrand and Sykes, Daniel
In: Bernardo, Marco and Issarny, Valérie eds. Formal Methods for Eternal Networked Software Systems. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (6659) (pp. 27-52)
ISBN : 978-3-642-21455-4 | Publisher : Springer | Published : Berlin


Socio-Technical Resilience for Community Healthcare (2023-07-11)
Bennaceur, Amel; Stuart, Avelie; Price, Blaine; Bandara, Arosha; Levine, Mark; Clare, Linda; Cohen, Jessica; Mccormick, Ciaran; Mehta, Vikram; Bennasar, Mohamed; Gooch, Daniel; Gavidia-Calderon, Carlos; Kordoni, Anastasia and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : TAS '23 First International Symposium on Trustworthy Autonomous Systems (11-12 Jul 2023, Edinburgh, United Kingdom)


Meet your Maker: A Social Identity Analysis of Robotics Software Engineering (2023-07-11)
Gavidia-Calderon, Carlos; Bennaceur, Amel; Lopez, Tamara; Kordoni, Anastasia; Levine, Mark and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : TAS '23 First International Symposium on Trustworthy Autonomous Systems (11-12 Jul 2023, Edinburgh, United Kingdom)


Values@Runtime: An Adaptive Framework for Operationalising Values (2023)
Bennaceur, Amel; Hassett, Diane; Nuseibeh, Bashar and Zisman, Andrea
In : IEEE/ACM 45th International Conference on Software Engineering: Software Engineering in Society (ICSE-SEIS) (14-20 May 2023, Melbourne, Australia) (pp. 175-179)


Feel It, Code It: Emotional Goal Modelling for Gender-Inclusive Design (2023)
Hassett, Diane; Bennaceur, Amel and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : The 29th International Working Conference on Requirement Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality (17-20 Apr 2023, Barcelona, Spain)


What Do You Want From Me? Adapting Systems to the Uncertainty of Human Preferences (2022)
Gavidia-Calderon, Carlos; Bennaceur, Amel; Kordoni, Anastasia; Levine, Mark and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : 2022 IEEE/ACM 44th International Conference on Software Engineering: New Ideas and Emerging Results (ICSE-NIER) (21-29 May 2022, Pittsburgh, PA, USA) (pp. 126-130)


Quid Pro Quo: An Exploration of Reciprocity in Code Review (2022)
Gavidia-Calderon, Carlos; Han, DongGyun and Bennaceur, Amel
In : 19th International Conference on Mining Software Repositories (MSR ’22) (23-24 May 2022, Pittsburgh, PA, USA)


Impacts of Heterogeneous Chemistry on Vertical Profiles of Martian Ozone (2022)
Brown, M. A. J.; Patel, M. R.; Lewis, S. R.; Holmes, J. A.; Sellers, G. J.; Streeter, P. M.; Bennaceur, A.; Villanueva, G. L.; Liuzzi, G. and Vandaele, A. C.
In : 7th International Mars Atmospheric Modelling and Observation Conference (14-17 Jun 2022, Paris, France)


Seasonal and Global Ozone Variations With Heterogeneous Chemistry in the Martian Atmosphere (2022)
Brown, M. A. J.; Patel, M. R.; Lewis, S. R.; Holmes, J. A.; Mason, J. and Bennaceur, A.
In : 7th International Mars Atmospheric Modelling and Observation Conference (14-17 Jun 2022, Paris, France)


SERIES: A Task Modelling Notation for Resource-driven Adaptation (2022)
Akiki, Paul; Zisman, Andrea and Bennaceur, Amel
In : 24th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (25-27 Apr 2022, Online)


Work With What You’ve Got: An Approach for Resource-driven Adaptation (2021-11-18)
Akiki, Paul. A.; Bennaceur, Amel and Zisman, Andrea
In : IEEE International Conference on Autonomic Computing and Self-Organizing Systems Companion (ACSOS-C) (27 Sep - 1 Oct 2021, Washington, USA) (pp. 105-110)


On Adaptive Fairness in Software Systems (2021-05)
Farahani, Ali; Pasquale, Liliana; Bennaceur, Amel; Welsh, Tom and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : 2021 International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems, SEAMS 2021, Virtual, Online (18-21 May 2021, Spain) (pp. 97-103)


OASIS: Weakening User Obligations for Security-critical Systems (2020-10-09)
Tun, Thein Than; Bennaceur, Amel and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : 28th IEEE International Requirements Engineering Conference (31 Aug - 4 Sep 2020) (pp. 113-124)


How are you feeling? Using Tangibles to Log the Emotions of Older Adults (2020-02)
Gooch, Daniel; Mehta, Vikram; Price, Blaine; McCormick, Ciaran; Bandara, Arosha; Bennaceur, Amel; Bennasar, Mohamed; Stuart, Avelie; Clare, Linda; Levine, Mark; Cohen, Jessica and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : Fourteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (TEI ’20) (9-12 Feb 2020, Sydney, Australia) (pp. 31-43)


Investigating the relationship between ozone and water-ice clouds using retrieved data from the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (2020)
Brown, M. A. J.; Patel, M. R.; Lewis, S. R. and Bennaceur, A.
In : British Planetary Science Conference 2020 (13-15 Jan, Oxford)


Investigating the relationship between ozone and water-ice clouds in the martian atmosphere (2020)
Brown, Megan; Patel, Manish; Lewis, Stephen and Bennaceur, Amel
In : European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2011 (4-8 May 2020, Vienna, Austria)


Modelling and Analysing Resilient Cyber-Physical Systems (2019)
Bennaceur, Amel; Ghezzi, Carlo; Tei, Kenji; Kehrer, Timo; Weyns, Danny; Calinescu, Radu; Dustdar, Schahram; Honiden, Shinichi; Ishikawa, Fuyuki; Jin, Zhi; Kramer, Jeffrey; Litoiu, Marin; Loreti, Michele; Moreno, Gabriel; Muller, Hausi; Nenzi, Laura; Nuseibeh, Bashar; Pasquale, Liliana; Reisig, Wolfgang; Schmidt, Heinz; Tsigkanos, Christos and Zhao, Haiyan Zhao
In : 14th Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems 2019 (25-26 May 2019, Montréal, Canada)


Won’t Take No for an Answer: Resource-driven Requirements Adaptation (2019)
Bennaceur, Amel; Zisman, Andrea; Mccormick, Ciaran; Barthaud, Danny and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : 14th Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems 2019 (25-26 May 2019, Montréal, Canada)


Measuring the variation and distribution of ozone in the martian atmosphere (2019)
Brown, Megan; Patel, Manish; Lewis, Stephen and Bennaceur, Amel
In : 8th Conference of Astrobiology Society of Britain (25-26 Apr 2019, Newcastle University)


A Sensor Platform for Non-invasive Remote Monitoring of Older Adults in Real Time (2019)
Bennasar, Mohamed; Mccormick, Ciaran; Price, Blaine; Gooch, Daniel; Stuart, Avelie; Mehta, Vikram; Clare, Linda; Bennaceur, Amel; Cohen, Jessica; Bandara, Arosha; Levine, Mark and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : Innovation in Medicine and Healthcare Systems, and Multimedia (Jun 2019) (pp. 125-135)


Agree to Disagree: Security Requirements Are Different, But Mechanisms For Security Adaptation Are Not (2018-05-28)
Tun, Thein and Bennaceur, Amel
In : 13th International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems (28-29 May 2018, Gothenburg, Sweden) (pp. 194-195)


Issues in Gender Diversity and Equality in the UK (2018-05-28)
Bennaceur, A.; Cano, A.; Georgieva, L.; Kiran, M.; Salama, M. and Yadav, P.
In : 2018 ACM/IEEE 1st International Workshop on Gender Equality in Software Engineering (28 May 2018, Gothenburg, Sweden) (pp. 5-9)


Machine Learning for Software Engineering: Models, Methods, and Applications (2018)
Meinke, Karl and Bennaceur, Amel
In : 40th International Conference on Software Engineering: Technical Briefings (Part of ICSE 2018) (27 May - 03 Jun 2018, Gothenburg, Sweden) (pp. 548-549)


Feed me, Feed me: An Exemplar for Engineering Adaptive Software (2016)
Bennaceur, Amel; Mccormick, Ciaran; García Galán, Jesús; Perera, Charith; Smith, Andrew; Zisman, Andrea and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : 11th International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems (16-17 May 2016)


Layered connectors: revisiting the formal basis of architectural connection for complex distributed systems (2014-08)
Bennaceur, Amel and Issarny, Valérie
In : ECSA'14 - The 8th European Conference on Software Architecture (25-29 Aug 2014, Vienna, Austria) (pp. 283-299)


Requirements-driven mediation for collaborative security (2014)
Bennaceur, Amel; Bandara, Arosha; Jackson, Michael; Liu, Wei; Montrieux, Lionel; Tun, Thein; Yu, Yijun and Nuseibeh, Bashar
In : SEAMS'14 - The 9th International Symposium on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems (2-3 Jun 2014, Hyderabad)


Automated mediator synthesis: combining behavioural and ontological reasoning (2013)
Bennaceur, Amel; Chilton, Chris; Isberner, Malte and Jonsson, Bengt
In : SEFM - 11th International Conference on Software Engineering and Formal Methods (25-27 Sep 2013, Madrid) (pp. 274-288)


Automatic service categorisation through machine learning in emergent middleware (2013)
Bennaceur, Amel; Issarny, Valérie; Johansson, Richard; Moschitti, Alessandro; Spalazzese, Romina and Sykes, Daniel
In : 10th International Symposium on Formal Methods for Components and Objects (FMCO 2011) (3-5 Oct 2011, Turin) (pp. 133-149)


Machine learning for emergent middleware (2013)
Bennaceur, Amel; Issarny, Valérie; Sykes, Daniel; Howar, Falk; Isberner, Malte; Steffen, Bernhard; Johansson, Richard and Moschitti, Alessandro
In : Second International Workshop on Trustworthy Eternal Systems via Evolving Software, Data and Knowledge (28 Aug 2012, Montpellier) (pp. 16-29)


Achieving interoperability through semantics-based technologies: the instant messaging case (2012)
Bennaceur, Amel; Issarny, Valérie; Spalazzese, Romina and Tyagi, Shashank
In : ISWC 2012 - 11th International Semantic Web Conference (11-15 Nov 2012, Boston) (pp. 17-33)


Inferring affordances using learning techniques (2012)
Bennaceur, Amel; Johansson, Richard; Moschitti, Alessandro; Spalazzese, Romina; Sykes, Daniel; Saadi, Rachid and Issarny, Valérie
In : EternalS'11: International Workshop on Eternal Systems (3 May 2011, Budapest) (pp. 79-87)


The role of ontologies in emergent middleware: supporting interoperability in complex distributed systems (2011)
Blair, Gordon S.; Bennaceur, Amel; Georgantas, Nikolaos; Grace, Paul; Issarny, Valérie; Nundloll, Vatsala and Paolucci, Massimo
In : Middleware 2011 - ACM/IFIP/USENIX 12th International Middleware Conference (12-16 Dec 2011, Lisbon) (pp. 410-430)


Towards an architecture for runtime interoperability (2010)
Bennaceur, Amel; Blair, Gordon; Chauvel, Franck; Gang, Huang; Georgantas, Nikolaos; Grace, Paul; Howar, Falk; Inverardi, Paola; Issarny, Valrie; Paolucci, Massimo; Pathak, Animesh; Spalazzese, Romina; Steffen, Bernhard and Souville, Bertrand
In : ISoLA 2010 - 4th International Symposium On Leveraging Applications of Formal Methods, Verification and Validation (18-21 Oct 2011, Heraclion, Crete) (pp. 206-220)


The iBICOOP middleware: enablers and services for emerging pervasive computing environments (2009)
Bennaceur, Amel; Singh, Pushpendra; Raverdy, Pierre-Guillaume and Issarny, Valerie
In : PerWare 2009 IEEE Middleware Support for Pervasive Computing Workshop (9-13 Mar 2009, Galveston, TX)


Feature-driven Mediator Synthesis: Supporting Collaborative Security in the Internet of Things (2016)
Bennaceur, Amel; Tun, Thein; Bandara, Arosha; Yu, Yijun and Nuseibeh, Bashar
Department of Computing, The Open University