Staff Profile
Professor Daniel Coca
Prof of Nonlinear and Complex Systems, Head of School
- Email: daniel.coca@ncl.ac.uk
Daniel is Professor of Nonlinear and Complex Systems with over 25 years’ experience in the field of engineering and higher education. Before joining 缅北禁地 he was Head of the Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering at the University of Sheffield, a post he held for eight years.
Daniel has extensive expertise in system identification and control of complex systems as well as signal processing, data analytics and machine learning using reconfigurable and GPU computing platforms. He has developed theory, methodology and algorithms to analyse, model and control fluid flows, reaction-diffusion systems, crystal growth processes and stem cell differentiation and pioneered the application of high-performance FPGA-based reconfigurable computers for real-time peptide mass fingerprinting, protein identification and quantitation. Funded by BBSRC and NSF in the US, he jointly led the development of the “”, a GPU-enabled platform for data analysis, modelling, simulation and visualisation of the fruit fly brain, which won the first phase of the Open Science Prize in 2016 and was included in the BBSRC Impact Showcase 2020.
He is member of the executive board of the Data and Analytics Facility for National Infrastructure (DAFNI) and Co-Director of the Urban Flows Observatory, which he helped establish as part of a £10 million investment from the UK Collaboratorium for Research on Infrastructure and Cities (UKCRIC).
Daniel has won research grants with a value of over £50 million from EPSRC, BBSRC, MRC, US National Science Foundation and the Human Frontiers Science Program.
MODELLING, ANALYSIS AND CONTROL OF COMPLEX SYSTEMS
- Nonlinear Systems Identification and Analysis in the Time and Frequency Domains
- Identification and control of infinite dimensional systems described by partial differential equations, coupled map lattice and cellular automata models
SIGNAL PROCESSING AND MACHINE LEARNING
- Theoretical foundations and new learning paradigms for Liquid State Machines and Echo-State Networks
- Time Encoding and Decoding Machines - Theory and Algorithms
- Matrix Completion
- Adversarial attacks on Black-Box Agents
- Inverse Problems Theory and Application to Diffuse Optical Tomography
APPLICATION OF SYSTEMS AND CONTROL ENGINEERING IN BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE
- Modelling and Control of Heterogeneity and Differentiation in human Embryonic Stem Cells
- Molecular Mechanisms Driving Chronic Macrophage Dysfunction in Aging
- Reverse Engineering Neural Circuits in the Early Visual System of Drosophila
- Quantitative Assessment and Characterisation of Endothelial Function Using Diffuse Optical Tomography
- System Biology for Novel Therapeutic Strategies for Polycystic Kidney Disease
GPU/FPGA ACCELERATION FOR HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMPUTING
- GPU Acceleration of Large-Scale Neural Networks - see the
- FPGA Acceleration of Protein Identification and Quantitation Algorithms
RESEARCH GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS
CURRENT GRANT SUPPORT
EPSRC (2022-2025), Sustainable Microwave Manufacturing of Functional Inorganic Materials (SUMMA) (Co-I)
EPSRC (2021-2023), DAFNI-ROSE (Co-I)
CMMI-EPSRC (2021-2024), Right First Time Manufacture of Pharmaceuticals (Co-I)
MRC/DTP (2018-2023), Artificial Intelligence Technology for Cell Therapy Manufacturing (PI)
COMPLETED PROJECTS
EPSRC (2019-2022) The Active Building Centre (Co-I)
EPSRC (2018-2020), CORONA: City Observatory Research platfOrm for iNnovation and Analytics
BBSRC/NSF (2015-2018), The Digital Fruit Fly Brain (PI)
EPSRC (2017-2021), Urban Observatories (Co-I)
BBSRC (2013-2016), Understanding Neural Excitation and Inhibition: Implications for the Interpretation of Extracellular Field Potentials and Neurovascular Coupling (Co-I)
Human Frontiers Science Program (2012-2015), Stem Cell Dynamics in Time and Space (Co-I)
BBSRC (2010-2013), Reverse Engineering Drosophila Retinal Networks (PI)
MRC Fellowship (2009-2010), Stem Cell Dynamics: Exploration of the Stem Cell Attractor Landscape
EPSRC (2009-2014), System Identification and Information Processing for Complex Systems (Co-I)
EPSRC (2009-2012), System Identification and Model Validation for Spatio-Temporal Dynamical Systems (Co-I)
BBSRC (2008-2011), FPGA Supercomputing Technology for High-throughput Identification and Quantitation in Proteomics (PI)
BBSRC (2008-2009), Hardware Accelerated Pipeline for Proteomics (PI)
EPSRC (2006-2009), System Identification and Signal Processing for Neuroimaging Data Analysis (Co-I)
EPSRC (2006-2009), System Identification and Signal Processing for Compl;ex Systems (Co-I)
BBSRC (2004-2007), Application of Field Programmable Gate Arrays to Eliminate Bottlenecks in Near-instrument Proteomics (Co-I)
EPSRC (2004-2007), Adaptive Control of Infinite Dimensional Systems using Reconfigurable Computers (PI)
Royal Society (2004-2005), Optimal Control and Stabilisation of Parabolic-like Equations (PI)
International Space Science Institute (2004-2005), Observable Features of Avalanching Systems (Co-I)
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Articles
- Munir M, Mayfield M, Coca D. . Atmosphere 2021, 12(2), 179.
- Wang P, Mihaylova L, Munir S, Chakraborty R, Wang J, Mayfield M, Alam K, Khokhar M, Coca D. . Signal Processing 2021, 183, 108034.
- Nie X, Coca D, Luo J, Birkin M. . Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulation 2020, 90, 105302.
- Munir S, Mayfield M, Coca D, Mihaylova L. . Atmosphere 2020, 11(7), 736.
- Munir S, Mayfield M, Coca D, Jubb SA. . ScienceDirect 2019, 2, 100027.
- Genes C, Esnaola I, Perlaza SM, Ochoa LF, Coca D. . IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid 2019, 10(4), 4057-4067.
- Whyte J, Fitzgerald J, Mayfield M, Coca D, Pierce K, Shah N. . INCOSE International Symposium 2019, 29(1), 542-542.
- Florescu D, Coca D. . Neural Computation 2019, 31(9), 1825-1852.
- Fernandez-Musoles C, Coca D, Richmond P. . Frontiers in Neuroinformatics 2019, 13, 19.
- Munir S, Mayfield M, Coca D, Jubb S, Osammor O. . Environmental Monitoring Assessment 2019, 191, 94.
- Neagu M, Coca D, Ong ACM. . American Journal of Kidney Diseases 2018, 71(6), 912-913.
- Nie X, Luo J, Coca D, Birkin M, Chen J. . Journal of Nonlinear Science 2018, 28, 1467-1487.
- Florescu D, Coca D. . Neural Computation 2018, 30(3), 670–707.
- Tan LM, Arbabi H, Li Q, Sheng Y, Densley Tingley D, Mayfield M, Coca D. . Resources, Conservation & Recycling 2018, 138, 172-182.
- Nie X, Coca D. . Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulation 2018, 54, 248-266.
- Vidal-Rosas EE, Billings SA, Chico T, Coca D. . Journal of Biomedical Optics 2016, 21(6), 066012.
- Friederich U, Billings SA, Hardie RC, Juusola M, Coca D. . PLoS One 2016, 11(6), e0157993.
- Florescu D, Coca D. . Neural Computation 2015, 27(9), 1872-1898.
- Barbaric I, Biga V, Gokhale PJ, Jones M, Stavish D, Glen A, Coca D, Andrews PW. . Stem Cell Reports 2014, 3(1), 142-155.
- Vidal-Rosas EE, Billings SA, Zheng Y, Mayhew JE, Johnston D, Kennerley AJ, Coca D. . Journal of Biomedical Optics 2014, 19(2), 026008.