Dr Alma Rahat

Profiles

Dr Alma Rahat

External Advisor

Doctoral College Administration - Student Administration (Academic Registry)

Qualifications

I have a BEng (Hons.) in Electronic Engineering from the University of Southampton and a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Exeter. I worked as a product development engineer after my bachelor's degree, and held post-doctoral research positions at the University of Exeter. I joined University of Plymouth in September 2018.  

Professional membership

I am a member of the following professional organizations. 

  • Institution of Engineering and Technology (MIET)
  • Special Interest Group on Genetic and Evolutionary Computation (SIGEVO) in the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM). 
I am also a member of the task force on Data Driven Evolutionary Optimization of Exepensive Problems.

Teaching

Teaching interests

As a learner, I have always felt that there is sometimes a lack of connection between the real world and the materials covered in a course. When lecturers clearly demonstrated the real implications of what was being taught in an interactive manner, I was most motivated to learn the materials, and also could readily apply the knowledge effectively. This worked best when a scenario or problem was presented first, and the way to solve the problem was discussed later. Such a constructivist approach underpins my teaching ethos, and I endeavour to apply this teaching technique in my modules.

In the 2018-19 academic year, I was the module leader for the following modules. 

  • SOFT251: Object-Oriented Programming
  • SOFT252: Object-oriented Software Engineering with Design Patterns
  • NET109: Computer Architecture and Mathematics
  • NET111: Computer Systems
  • SOFT164: Operating Systems, Data Structures and Algorithms

Alongside managing these modules, I taught principles of object-oriented design and analysis, design patterns, fundamentals of computer architecture, and assembly programming. 

In the 2019-20 academic year, I will be teaching the following modules. 

  • SOFT252: Object-oriented Software Engineering with Design Patterns
  • AINT252: Computation Theory and Artificial Intelligence. 

Research

Research interests

My current research focus is in the broad areas of fast hybrid optimisation methods, real-world problems and machine learning. In particular, I am developing efficient methods inspired from surrogate-assisted (Bayesian) optimisation for optimising computationally or financially expensive problems (for example, computational fluid dynamics design problems).

Personal

Conferences organised

I was the lead organiser of the Workshop on Surrogate-Assisted Evolutionary Optimisation at GECCO ( 2016 , 2017 , 2018 ). See this website for more information. 

Other academic activities

I am a reviewer for the following journals. 

I was on the program committee the following conferences.