Stefano Severi, Ph.D.Postdoctoral Fellow, Member, IEEE

School of Engineering & Science - SESJacobs University Bremenwww.gabreu.jacobs-university.de

Room 80b - Research ICampus Ring 1, 28759

Bremen, GermanyH +49 176 61 35 67 51T +49 421 200 3272B s.severi@jacobs-

university.de

Bremen, 31st October 2014

Post-Doctoral FellowResearch InterestsMy research activities can be briefly grouped under the broad context of wirelesscommunications. In particular I am interested into many activities related, butnot limited, to wireless sensor networks (WSNs): clock synchronization, super-resolution ranging techniques, localization (with its many variants: cooperative,algebraic, multihop, swarm and semantic), high-precision positioning and track-ing, positioning with confidence and secrecy. Furthermore I am active on re-search on the physical layer of many wireless communications protocols, includ-ing Ultra-wideband, WiFi, Bluetooth and Zigbee-based solutions. These topicsfind natural and practical application under the context of Internet of Things(IoT), Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) and Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS).A special mention is for my research on Physical Layer Security: in this areaI also patented a secret key exchange mechanism for short-range communica-tions.

Teaching ActivitiesFall 2014 300392 Elect. and Comp. Engineering Specialization Areas Lab (Jacobs Uni-

versity) - Lecturer (Undergraduate Course)Course Content: Positioning for Wireless Systems. The module is dividedinto three distinct parts: i) ranging techniques for wireless systems; ii) super-resolution ranging techniques; iii) localization algorithms. Each part combinestheory with practical experiences, in particular with the collection of on-fielddata measurements from actual wireless devices imported and analyzed in Mat-lab.

Fall 2013 300392 Elect. and Comp. Engineering Specialization Areas Lab (Jacobs Uni-versity) - Lecturer (Undergraduate Course)

Fall 2012 300392 Elect. and Comp. Engineering Specialization Areas Lab (Jacobs Uni-versity) - Lecturer (Undergraduate Course)

2010-2011 Signal Processing (University of Bologna) - Lecturer (Undergraduate Course)Course Content: Basic elements of deterministic signals characterization and pro-cessing. A/D-D/A conversion. Elements of probability theory.

2009-2010 Signal Processing (University of Bologna) - Lecturer (Undergraduate Course)2008-2009 Principles of Signal Processing (University of Bologna) - Grader (Undergradu-

ate Course)Course Content: Basic elements of signal characterization and processing withparticular reference to communication systems.

2007-2008 Principles of Signal Processing (University of Bologna) - Grader (Undergradu-ate Course)

1/7

2007-2008 Digital Signal Processing Laboratory (University of Bologna) - Tutor (Under-graduate Course)Course Content: The course gives elements for the analysis and the developmentof digital signal processing systems, with particular emphasis to communica-tions. In this field, the digitization of signals have lead to a substantial integra-tion of various forms of information, named multimedia, where voice, text, data,fixed and moving images, are jointly processed, stored and transmitted.

2007-2008 Multimedia Digital Signal Processing - Tutor (Graduate Course)Course Content: The course gives elements for the analysis, design and character-ization of digital signal processing systems. The analysis and design of the tech-niques considered are carried out through the development of Matlab softwareroutines. The algorithms are then implemented on commercial Digital SignalProcessor (DSP) platforms, and tested by measurements. During the class, thecourse gives basic knowledge of digital signal processing. The laboratory exer-cises allow the student to practise with software tools (like the Matlab platform)as well as hardware (DSP) necessary to digital signal processing.

2006-2007 Principles of Signal Processing - Grader (Undergraduate Course)

Technical Program Committees Membership

2015 TPC Member - IEEE 12th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication(WPNC’15)

2015 TPC Member - IEEE ICC 2015 Workshop on Advances in Network Localization andNavigation (ANLN)

2014 TPC Member - IEEE 11th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication(WPNC’14)

2014 TPC Member - IEEE 80th Vehicular Technology Conference (VTC2014-Fall)2014 TPC Member - European Conference on Networks and Communications (EuCNC’14)2013 TPC Member - IEEE 10th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication

(WPNC’13)2012 TPC Member - IEEE 9th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication

(WPNC’12)2011 TPC Member - IEEE 8th Workshop on Positioning, Navigation and Communication

(WPNC’11)

Peer Reviewer (Journals)

Reviewer - IEEE Transactions on Wireless CommunicationsReviewer - IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Signal ProcessingReviewer - IEEE Transactions on CommunicationsReviewer - IEEE Transactions on Mobile ComputingReviewer - IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems IIReviewer - IEEE Communications LettersReviewer - IET Microwaves, Antennas & PropagationReviewer - EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and NetworkingReviewer - EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing

Project Activities

submitted HIGHTS - H2020 Research and Innovation Project (High precision positioning forCooperative-ITS)My Role: Project coordinator.Topics: Cooperative radio location, self-localization and communication (V2X)technologies for vehicles.Partners: Jacobs University Bremen, Eurecom, DLR, CEA, Chalmers TekniskaHoegskola, FBConsulting, Bosch, BMW, Tass, BeSpoon, ZigPos, PaulsConsul-tancy, Objective Software, Ibeo, Innotec21.

2/7

Project Description: Cooperative intelligent transport system (C-ITS) applica-tions rely on knowledge of the geographical positions of vehicles. Unfortunately,satellite-based positioning systems (e.g., GPS and Galileo) are unable to providesufficiently accurate position information for many important applications andin certain challenging but common environments (e.g., urban canyons and tun-nels). This project addresses this problem by combining traditional satellite sys-tems with an innovative use of on-board sensing and infrastructure-based wire-less communication technologies (e.g., Wi-Fi, ITS-G5, UWB tracking, Zigbee,Bluetooth, LTE...) to produce advanced, highly-accurate positioning technolo-gies for C-ITS. The results will be integrated into the facilities layer of ETSI C-ITSarchitecture and will thereby become available for all C-ITS applications, includ-ing those targeting the challenging use cases Traffic Safety of Vulnerable Usersand Autonomous Driving/platooning. The project will therefore go beyond ego-and infra-structure-based positioning by incorporating them as building blocksto develop an enhanced European-wide positioning service platform based onenhanced Local Dynamic Maps and built on open European standards. Proof-of-concept systems developed in the project will combine infrastructure devices,reference vehicles, communication between road users and offline processing,and will be evaluated under real conditions at TASS’ test site in Helmond, withthe objective of assessing its capabilities to provide high precision positioningto C-ITS applications. When possible, codes and prototypes will be fully open-source and made available to the larger research community as well as to the au-tomotive industry at the end of the project. All achievements will be publishedin top-tier events further guaranteeing an open-access to all technical publica-tions produced. The project also aims at a strong commitment to bringing thedeveloped solutions to standardization bodies

2011-2014 BUTLER - FP7 European Integrated Project (uBiquitous, secUre inTernet-of-thingswith Location and contEx-awaReness)My Role: Workpackage Leader, Project Manager for my Research Unit (JacobsUniversity).Topics: Context-awareness and Security technologies for the Internet of Things.Partners: Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, Telecom Italia, ST Microelectronics, CEA-Leti, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, CasCard, FBConsulting, Swisscom, iHome-Lab, Instituto Superiore Mario Boella, Inno, Gemalto, Philips, TST Sistemas, Uni-versity of Luxembourg, Tecnalia, ZigPos, CWC University of Oulu, Banco San-tander, Santander City Council, Maya Technologies, Jacobs University Bremen.Project Description: BUTLER is an FP7 EU project acronym for uBiquitous,secUre inTernet-of-things with Location and contEx-awaReness which startedOctober 1, 2011 and would last 36 months. A consortium of INNO (coordina-tor) and 17 partners from 8 countries with strong industry participation (6 aca-demic institutions and 11 companies) are all involved. BUTLER will be the firstEU project to emphasise pervasiveness, context-awareness and security for IoT.Through a consortium of leading Industrial, Corporate R&D and Academic part-ners with extensive and complementary know-how, BUTLER will integrate cur-rent and develop new technologies to form a “bundle”of applications, platformfeatures and services that will bring IoT to life.

3/7

BUTLER is focusing on: a) Improving/creating enabling technologies to imple-ment a well-defined vision of secure, pervasive and context-aware IoT, wherelinks are inherently secure (from PHY to APP layers) applications cut across dif-ferent scenarios (Home, Office, Transportation, Health, etc.), and the network re-actions to users are adjusted to their needs (learned and monitored in real time);b) Integrating/developing a new flexible smartDevice-centric network architec-ture where platforms (devices) function according to three well-defined cate-gories: smartObject (sensors, actuators, gateways), smartMobile (user’s personaldevice) and smartServers (providers of contents and services), interconnectedover IPv6; c) Building a series of field trials, which progressively integrate andenhance state-of-the-art technologies to showcase BUTLER’s secure, pervasiveand context-aware vision of IoT.

2008-2011 EUWB - FP7 European Integrated Project (Coexisting Short Range Radio by Ad-vanced Ultra-Wideband Radio Technology)My Role: Project Engineer, main referent for my Research Unit (Unibo) withinWP4.Topics: Multihop networks with localization capabilities (PHY, Network andApplication layers).Partners: Bosch, Philips, Thales, TES Electric, EADS, Wisair, Telefonica, CEA-Leti, Università di Bologna, Universidad de Zaragoza, Universit’́at Duisburg-Essen, Leibniz Universit’́at Hannover, Technische Universit’́at Ilmenau, CWCUniversity of Oulu.Project Description: The EUWB project known as Coexisting Short Range Radioby Advanced Ultra-Wideband Radio Technology: was supported by the Euro-pean Union’s 7th Framework Programme for Research and Technological De-velopment . It was started in April 2008 and completed in July 2011. It is anindustry-led initiative of 26 major industrial, highly regarded academic and ex-cellent consulting partners from Europe and Israel was formed. Ultra-Widebandradio technology (UWB-RT) enables short range wireless communications withdata rates ranging up to Gigabit per second as well as precise real-time locationtracking inherently due to UWB?s unique feature of ultra-wide radio frequencyband allocation. Widespread application of this innovative wireless technologywill facilitate growth of a number of market segments ? all different, but all en-abled by the unique features of UWB-RT being highly scalable with regard tocomplexity, range, costs and throughput as well as location precision accuracy.UWB-RT provides a minimum of interference to other electronic equipment com-pared to existing alternative radio solutions. EUWB’s key objective is to exploitthe enormous potential of the innovative and disruptive radio technology em-bodied in Ultra-Wideband Radio Technology (UWB-RT) for key industrial sec-tors in Europe by innovation of cutting-edge short range radio solutions. EUWBaims at consolidating the technical advances in scientific areas related to UWB-RT and combining them in order to define system concepts and enable the imple-mentation of applications for envisaged four application areas: HeterogeneousNetwork, Public Transport, Home Environment, and Automotive.

2007 IRMA - Italian Project enhanced by Defense MinisterMy Role: Project Engineer, deliverable editor.Topics: Anti-intruder system based on UWB multistatic radar.Partners: Classified information.Project Description: Classified information

4/7

Student Supervision

exp. grad. 2017 Alireza Ghods, PhD, with Prof. Giuseppe Abreu.Topic: “Vehicular Localization Techniques”

exp. grad. 2015 Simona Maria Poilinca, PhD, with Prof. Giuseppe Abreu.Topic: “Causal Inference via Information Theoretic Measures”

exp. grad. 2014 Omotayo Olabowale Oshiga, PhD, with Prof. Giuseppe Abreu.Topic: “Mutually Conditional Ranging and Trilateration for Wireless Localization”

graduated 2007 Angelo Facondini, M.Eng, with Prof. Marco Chiani and Prof. Andrea Giorgetti.Topic: “UWB Localization Systems: Detection Algorithms for Multistatic Radar”

graduated 2007 Andrea Urbini, M.Eng, with Prof. Marco Chiani and Prof. Andrea Giorgetti.Topic: “UWB Localization Systems: Clutter-Removal Algorithms for MultistaticRadar”

graduated 2006 Milos Jankovic, B.Eng, with Prof. Davide Dardari.Topic: “Project and Development of a Bayesian Filters-based Localization Algorithm”

graduated 2006 Gregory Gaddoni, B.Eng, with Prof. Davide Dardari.Topic: “Performances Testing and Comparison of Radio Localization Techniques”

EducationJune 2010 Ph.D. – Electronics, Computer Sciences and Systems

University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy- Thesis Title: “Cooperative Wireless Networks for Localization”My Doctoral research addresses the problem of localization, and analyzes itscrucial aspects, within the context of cooperative wireless sensor networks. Thethree main issues discussed in this period are: network synchronization, posi-tion estimate and tracking. A new approach based on the estimation theoryhas been proposed to evaluate the ultimate performance limit in network timesynchronization. Concerning the position estimate problem, the research was fo-cused on the problem of flip-ambiguity for algorithms with incomplete ranginginformation and on the issue of position estimate within multihop networks, i.e.networks with a low degree of connectivity. Finally it has been addressed alsothe problem of passive and active tracking, within the context of Wireless Lanand Ultrawide-Band infrastructures. My Doctoral studies were fully supportedby a three year-scholarship from the Italian Government.

March 2006 M.Eng. – Telecommunications Engineering2nd Faculty of Engineering, University of Bologna, Cesena, Italy- Thesis Title: “Study and Implementation of an Indoor WiFi-based Location System”I developed a new low-complexity tracking algorithm inspired by the Fano’ssequential decoding algorithm for the position tracking of a user in a WLAN-based indoor localization system. The positioning infrastructure consists of aIEEE 802.11 wireless LAN and of a radio map of the indoor environment, whichis available to the user. The position estimation is performed comparing the sig-nal strength received by the user’s network card interface to the signal strengthvalues stored in the radio map. By introducing a tracking algorithm, it improvesthe accuracy of the system, by reducing the number of position estimates whichare less probable or impossible for a given environment topology.

October 2003 B.Eng. – Telecommunications Engineering2nd Faculty of Engineering, University of Bologna, Cesena, Italy- Thesis Title: “Study and Implementation of a IEEE 802.11 Network”

5/7

Awards & Honors2008 Scolarship - Visiting Ph.D. - Marco Polo Grant for 3 months in Oulu, Finland2008 Grant - Winner of Student Travel Grant - IEEE ICC 2008, Beijing, PRC2007 Scholarship - Doctoral Grant - by Italian Government2007 Prize - Winner of Best Paper Award Contest - IST Mobile Summit 2007, Budapest,

Hungary

LanguagesItalian Native

English FluentGerman Conversant

International PatentP1 Stefano Severi and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Method to Generate

Encryption Key for Short-range Communications,” IPR-20122, February 2014.

Publication RecordJ01 IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications (to appear)

Omotayo Oshiga, Stefano Severi and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Superresolution Multi-point Ranging with Optimized Sampling via Orthogonally Designed Golomb Rulers,” IEEE Trans-actions on Wireless Communications, 2014.

C18 IEEE Asilomar - Monterey, USA 2014Alireza Ghods, Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu, Samuel Van de Velde andHeidi Steendam: “On the Structural Nature of Cooperation in Distributed Network Localization,”Proc. IEEE Fourty-Eight Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems and Computers, (Asilomar 2014),November 2-5, 2014.

C17 EuCNC - Bologna, Italy 2014Stefano Severi, Francesco Sottile, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu, Claudio Pastrone, Mau-rizio Spirito and Friedbert Berens: “M2M Technologies: Enablers for a Pervasive Internet ofThings,” Proc. European Conference on Networks and Communications, (EuCNC 2014), June 23-26,2014.

C16 IEEE WCNC - Istanbul, Turkey 2014Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu, Davide Dardari and Gianni Pasolini: “A SecretKey Exchange Scheme For Near Field Communication,” Proc. IEEE Wireless Communications andNetworking Conference, (WCNC 2014), April 6-9, 2014.

C15 IEEE WCNC - Istanbul, Turkey 2014Omotayo Oshiga, Stefano Severi and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Optimized Super-Resolution Ranging over ToA Measurements,” Proc. IEEE Wireless Communications and NetworkingConference, (WCNC 2014), April 6-9, 2014.

C14 MT-ITS - Dresden, Germany -Invited- 2013Alireza Ghods, Stefano Severi and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Location Forwarding forDense Urban Environment,” Proc. 3rd International Conference on Models and Technologies for Intelli-gent Transport Systems , (MT-ITS 2013), December 2-4, 2013.

C13 IEEE Asilomar - Monterey, USA -Invited- 2013Gianni Pasolini, Davide Dardari, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Stefano Severi: “TheEffect of Channel Spatial Correlation on Physical Layer Security in Multi-antenna Scenarios,”Proc. IEEE Fourty-Seventh Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems and Computers, (Asilomar 2013),November 3-6, 2013.

6/7

C12 IEEE WPNC - Dresden, Germany 2013Omotayo Oshiga, Stefano Severi and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Non-parametric Es-timation of Error Bounds in LOS and NLOS Environments” Proc. IEEE Workshop on PositioningNavigation and Communication, (WPNC 2013), March 20-21, 2013.

C11 IEEE Asilomar - Monterey, USA 2012Jani Saloranta, Stefano Severi, Davide Macagnano and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Alge-braic Confidence for Sensor Localization,” Proc. IEEE Fourty-Sixth Asilomar Conference on Signals,Systems and Computers, (Asilomar 2012), November 4-7, 2012.

C10 IEEE WPNC - Dresden, Germany 2012Simona Poilinca, Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Davide Macagnano: “Im-proved localization of Ultra-Wideband devices using Kalman Filter on super MDS estimated po-sitions,” Proc. IEEE Workshop on Positioning Navigation and Communication, (WPNC 2012), March15-16, 2012.

C9 IEEE IWSSIP - Vienna, Austria -Invited- 2012Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Davide Dardari: “Distributed Localization:Multihop Versus Message-Passing,” Proc. IEEE International Workshop on Systems, Signals and ImageProcessing (IWSSIP 2012), 11 - 13 April, 2012.

C8 IEEE Asilomar - Monterey, USA 2011Golaleh Rahmatollahi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Stefano Severi: “Cooperative Mul-tihop Localization with Privacy,” Proc. IEEE Fourty-Fifth Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems andComputers, (Asilomar 2011), November 6-9, 2011.

C7 IEEE CTW - Sitges, Spain 2011Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Destino and Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu: “Distributed Multi-hop Localization: An Energy-Efficient Approach,” Proc. IEEE Communication Theory Workshop(CTW 2011), June 20-22, 2011.

C6 IEEE WPNC - Dresden, Germany 2011Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Davide Dardari: “Multihop versusMessage-Passing: a Complexity and Accuracy Comparison for Distributed Localization,” Proc.IEEE Workshop on Positioning Navigation and Communication, (WPNC 2011), March 7-8, 2011.

C5 IEEE WPNC - Dresden, Germany 2010Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu and Davide Dardari: “A Quantitative Com-parison of Multihop Localization Algorithms,” Proc. IEEE Workshop on Positioning Navigation andCommunication, (WPNC 2010), March 11, 2010.

C4 IEEE Asilomar - Monterey, USA 2009Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu, Giuseppe Destino and Davide Dardari: “Effi-cient and Accurate Localization in Multihop Networks,” Proc. IEEE Fourty-Third Asilomar Confer-ence on Signals, Systems and Computers, (Asilomar 2009), November 1-4, 2009.

C3 IEEE Globecom - Honolulu, USA 2009Stefano Severi, Giuseppe Thadeu Freitas de Abreu, Giuseppe Destino and Davide Dardari: “Un-derstanding and Solving Flip-Ambiguity in Network Localization via Semidefinite Program-ming,” Proc. IEEE Global Conference on Telecommunications (Globecom 2009), 30 November 30th- 4 December, 2009.

C2 IEEE ICC - Beijng, PRC -Student Travel Grant- 2008Stefano Severi, and Davide Dardari: “Performance Limits of Time Synchronization in WirelessSensor Networks,” in Proc. IEEE International Conference on Communications - Wireless NetworkingSymposium, (ICC 2008), May 19-23, 2008.

C1 IST Mobile Summit - Budapest, Hungary -Best Paper Award- 2007Stefano Severi, Gianluigi Liva, Davide Dardari and Marco Chiani: “A New Low-Complexity UserTracking Algorithm for WLAN-Based Positioning Systems,” in Proc. 16th IST Mobile & WirelessCommunications Summit (IST-Summit 2007), July 1-5, 2007.

7/7