Our Team
Meet the team behind the Drone Systems Laboratory.
Prof. James Riordan
Director and Principal InvestigatorJames is Professor of Robotics & Autonomous Systems. His research focuses on AI-driven robotic perception. He is Principal Investigator on multiple projects funded by the European Commission, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and the Natural Environmnet Research Council (NERC), and he is Programme Leader of the MSc Advanced Drone Technology.
Callum Knox
Research Project ManagerCallum is Research Project Manager and Innovation Broker. As Chief Drone Pilot and Accountable Person with the Civil Aviation Authority, he also oversees the university’s Specific Category Operational Authorisation. Holding an MSc in Applied Social Research, Callum leads stakeholder engagement initiatives.
Dr. Manduhu Manduhu
Senior Post Doctoral Research AssistantManduhu received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in information engineering from Hiroshima University, Japan, in 2010 and 2013, respectively. His research interests include optimisation of parallel algorithms, physics modelling and simulation ,and intelligent computer vision.
Alex Dow
Post Doctoral Research AssistantAlex is a Research Assistant on the UKRI Digital Dairy Chain and NERC FLORA-SAGE projects, focusing on hyperspectral monitoring of biodiversity and ecosystem health in permanent grasslands. He holds an MSc in Digital Signal and Image Processing from University of Sussex. Currently completing his PhD at DSL, he previously worked on real-time LiDAR-based object detection for drones as part of the H2020 RAPID project (Risk-Aware Port Inspection Drones).
Dr. Althaff Irfan Cader Mohideen
Cybersecurity LecturerAlthaff is Programme Leader for the MSc Cyber Security at UWS. Previously, he was a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Aberdeen and a Senior Lecturer at the University of Westminster. He holds a PhD in Information Science and Control Engineering from Nagaoka University of Technology, Japan (2011). His research spans cybersecurity, internet, and communication engineering, with a focus on trust and security in IoT cloud systems.
Dr. Raman Singh
Cybersecurity LecturerRaman is Programme Leader for MEng/BEng (Hons) Cyber Security at UWS. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Panjab University and completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship with Trinity College Dublin. He specialises in blockchain technologies, 5G security, intrusion detection, and machine learning for cybersecurity. Raman is a Cisco and ISC2-certified instructor.
Hector Arroyo Gonzalez
PhD Candidate: AI & Computer VisionHector is completing his PhD in Computer Vision, specialising in AI for drone autonomy. His research focuses on deep learning for 3D radar point cloud segmentation for drone collision avoidance. Hector has an MSc Data Science from University of Dundee and an MEng Civil Engineering from Edinburgh National University. Hector’s industrial doctorate was funded by The Data Lab and Codeplay Software Ltd.
Tamas Ilcsik
PhD Candidate: AI & Computer VisionTamas specialises in computer vision applied to environmental monitoring, in particular woodland disease monitoring and biodiversity assessment using drones. Tamas has an MSc in Artificial Intelligence and Applications from the University of Strathclyde. Tamas is working to bridge the gap between technology and ecology as part of the NERC funded FLORA-SAGE project.
Lucian E. Bândar
PhD Candidate: Drone CybersecurityEmil specialises in AI-driven security for drones. His PhD project focuses on developing a real-time digital twin with AI intrusion detection to enhance drone security when flying autonomously beyond visual line of sight. Key areas include anomaly detection, countersecurity evaluation, and Security-as-a-Service solutions for resilient UAS operations. Emil holds an MSc in Cyber Security from UWS.