“I’m impressed by the different fields in AI”

Francisco López Sánchez.

PhotoVictoria Skeidsvoll

As a student, you will be surrounded by well-known researchers and professors and you’ll experience a combination of lectures, seminars, group works and tutorials in an environment where teachers are personal, devoted and engaged. 

Friendly atmosphere 

“The atmosphere at the department is open and friendly. The staff members have helped me with whatever I’ve needed and our teachers take their duties properly, giving us the right tools to develop ourselves”, says Francisco López Sánchez, PhD student at the Department of Computing Science at Umeå university. 
 
He arrived from sunny Costa del Sol in Malaga, to Umeå after completing his master thesis in the field of High-Performance Computing applied to seismographic signals analytics in RWTH Aachen, Germany. 

“I helped accelerating the algorithms that identify and calculate what kind of processes take place underneath the earth and which are the components thereof, during an earthquake. That initially took an entire weekend to calculate and was reduced to roughly a couple of seconds. My researcher was very pleased”,” says Francisco López Sánchez, smiling.  

Different fields in AI 

López is particularly interested in AI, math and algorithms and that is also one of the reasons why he came to Umeå. 

“The Department of Computing Science is very well-known and has a really good reputation. I’m impressed by the different fields in AI and that the department takes part in the Wallenberg program WASP. It’s really good to hear that many of my colleagues are involved in these projects.”  

Now he is doing his PhD in High-Performance and Automatic Computing with Paolo Bientinesi, Professor in High-Performance Computing as supervisor.  

The High-Performance and Automatic Computing group is concerned with the development and analysis of efficient numerical algorithms, with focus on numerical linear algebra.

“AI and especially Machine Learning is based on mathematical operations. We can accelerate the calculating processes, which is of huge importance, for example, in surveillance. There can be a lot of cameras installed in a city or the subway to identify criminals. The cameras themselves cannot process the images. These have to be collected and compared to data bases of individuals at the same time as people are moving. Therefore, the process needs to be completed in a quick manner,” Francisco López Sánchez explains.

Student housing 

So far, Francisco López Sánchez enjoys the life in Umeå, doing what he is really interested in.

“As a PhD in Sweden you are given the opportunity to do what you want and are given enough time to do it. You also have a lot of benefits included; a minimum of 20 days of vacation is one of them”.

The International Housing Office at Umeå university has assisted with accommodation, at least for a couple of months. And Francisco hasn’t had any problem with the language, since all swedes are fluent in English.  

As a PhD student he is mainly focusing on his research.
“Life outside the university has up until now been filled with different sports activities. I’m content to live just a few minutes away from IKSU, one of Europe’s largest sports facilities“ Francisco says. “I also like the fact that I’m surrounded by nature and not concrete everywhere”.

A Master’s or a PhD opens up a wide range of possibilities. So far, Francisco López Sánchez has not decided what he wants to do in the future.
“But, if I were to say, a significant contribution in the field of High-Performance Computing. Then maybe teaching or perhaps I will have a career within industry. The department of Computing Science has a lot of connections”.