IEEE WIE UKI Ambassadors’ Scheme | Early Career Talk 4 – An Inspirational and Empowering Webinar for Women in Engineering
About this Event
IEEE WIE in Engineering is an initiative with the goal to facilitate the recruitment and retention of women in technical disciplines globally. We envision a vibrant community of IEEE women and men collectively using their diverse talents to innovate for the benefit of humanity.
Early Career Talk aims to expose the participants to novel areas and aspects of engineering for solving real world problems. It also aims to establish a link for networking, mentorship and to create a connection for research opportunities.
Speaker: Ferheen Ayaz
Area of career: Academia
Research interest: IoT security and privacy, blockchain, vehicular communications, AI
Talk topic: Internet-of-Vehicles (IoV) is a large-scaled network with increasing security and privacy challenges. Traditional security solutions are not applicable to IoV due to its heterogeneity, high mobility of nodes and low latency requirements. Blockchain ensures trust and security in IoV due to its features including consensus for credibility and immutability for tamper-proofing. In parallel, Federated Learning (FL) is a collaborative machine learning approach where local models are trained on private data and then aggregated centrally.
Blockchain can enhance FL by decentralisation and securing incentive distribution. This talk will discuss the integration of blockchain and FL to protect IoV security and privacy.
Biography: Ferheen Ayaz (Graduate Student Member, IEEE) received her B.E. and M.E. degree from NED University of Engineering and Technology, Pakistan, in 2010 and 2014, respectively. She is currently pursuing Ph.D. in vehicular communications security with blockchain, at University of Sussex, UK and will defend her thesis early next year. She has also started her postdoctoral research in security of machine learning with University of Glasgow. She is an ardent supporter of women in STEM and is actively working with Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee of her school.
Speaker: Medha Subramanian
Area of career: Industry
Research interests: I work in the field of power system simulation, modelling and optimisation
Talk topic: Power Flow Control (PFC) technology is expected to be one of the technology strategies required by Transmission System Operators (TSOs) worldwide achieve their 2030 visions. This technology assists TSOs in maximizing the amount of renewable energy that can be transported on the grid. Integrating a large number of PFC devices on the network provides significant benefits in controlling power flow and minimizing congestion. To get the maximum benefit offered by these devices, advanced software tools are required. Smart Wires, in collaboration with EirGrid (The Irish TSO) and EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute) are working on this project that focuses on building a sophisticated software tools that will enable operators like EirGrid to boost the flow of renewable energy on the electricity grid. This project is being financially supported by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI).
Biography: Medha Subramanian is a Power Systems Engineer at Smart Wires Inc. and is based in Dublin, Ireland. She received her Master’s in Electrical Power Engineering, with a specialisation in Smart AC and DC grids, from TU Delft, Netherlands in 2020.
She holds a Bachelor’s in Electrical Engineering from Shiv Nadar University, Greater Noida, India.
Speaker: Fairouz Mustafa
Area of career: Academia
Talk topic: Cryptocurrency towards attaining UN environmental goals
The sustainable agenda of the United Nations (UN) is set for 2030. Most of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) are directly or indirectly related to sustainable green energy and climate change risk. Researchers are already in doubt about the possibility of achieving the SDGs by the deadline. However, at the same time, we observe the popularity of blockchain-based cryptocurrency, generating a higher amount of capital in the digital financial asset market mainly because such trading can be done easier compared to traditional trading. Commonly, the companies are obliged to generate enough funds to reach non-financial targets, like SDGs.
Motivated by the financial gain companies achieve when they adhere to SDGs and to check how companies can arrange finance to achieve the non-financial objectives. There is a need to examine if the trading in cryptocurrency can be compatible with the SDGs, including Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG 7) focuses on affordable and clean energy. Also, Sustainable Development Goal (13) focuses on climate action.
Biography:
Fairouz Mustafa, PhD researcher in accounting and finance at Brunel University London. She joined academic life in 2020 after spending nine years of experience in the IT industry and project management to expand knowledge, develop a career and reflect on my experience. She participated in prestigious conferences, including BAFA, and became a British Accounting and Finance Association member.
Recently, Fairouz has published two papers in the Accounting Education Journal and Business Strategy and the Environment.
Speaker: Husnain Sherazi
Area of career: Academia
Talk topic: LPWANs; The Game Changer for Industrial Automation
Thanks to their inherent capabilities (such as fairly long radio coverage with extremely low power consumption), Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWANs) can support a wide spectrum of low-rate use-cases in Industry 4.0. The talk would aim to highlight the role of LPWANs in forming a smart eco-system and encompass critical trade-offs to be considered for sustainable IIOT solutions while paving the way forward for industrial automation.
Biography: Husnain Sherazi earned his PhD in Electrical and Information Engineering, at the Politecnico di Bari, Italy on the Ministerial Fellowship in 2018. He completed his BS and MS degrees in Computer Science on a fully funded fellowship from COMSATS University, Lahore, Pakistan in 2011 and 2013, respectively.
He is currently a Lecturer at the School of Computing and Engineering, University of West London, London, United Kingdom. He was a Researcher at Tyndall National Institute, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland from Sep. 2020 to May 2021. He has also served as Assistant Professor at GIFT University and Adjunct Professor at Superior University, Pakistan during Spring 2020. Previously, he has been with the Department of Electrical and Information Engineering, Politecnico di Bari, Italy as a Postdoctoral Researcher from Nov. 2018 to Oct. 2019. He has been on a research exchange at the University of Glasgow, UK from May 2017 to Jan. 2018.
Several articles in prestigious conferences and journals are on his credit. He is a reviewer of top-ranked journals and a TPC member of renowned conferences. Moreover, He is serving as Associate Editor (Internet Technology Letter), Area Editor (Ad Hoc Networks), Topic Editor (Electronics), and Guest Editor for a number of prestigious journals. Furthermore, he is a Senior Member IEEE, Member ACM, IEEE Young Professionals, IEEE ComSoc, and the IET. His research interests broadly span the areas of Internet of Things, Energy Harvesting, Industrial Automation, Blockchain Technologies, and Intelligent Transportation Systems
