Head
Dr. Athanasios Ch. Kapoutsis
Assistant Professor
Athanasios Kapoutsis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH) and the head of the AUtonomous Robotics Agents (AURA) Lab. His research interests include, i) inducing autonomy in real-world multi-robot systems, ii) spanning coverage/exploration path planning for UAVs/UGVs/AUVs, iii) reinforcement learning and multi-agent RL, and iv) large-scale distributed/adaptive control. During the past years, he has contributed to a broad portfolio of competitively funded R&D projects spanning EU FP7, H2020 and Horizon Europe programmes, as well as Greek national initiatives—taking on responsibilities ranging from key technical roles to project leadership. Across his work in competitively funded R&D, he has served through three institutional affiliations: the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) of the Centre for Research & Technology Hellas (CERTH), the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH), and the Institute for Language and Speech Processing (ILSP) of the Athena Research and Innovation Center (ARC).
Senior Researchers
Savvas Apostolidis
Senior Researcher
Savvas Apostolidis was born in Kavala, Greece, in 1993, and studied Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Democritus University of Thrace (D.U.Th.), graduating in 2018. After completing his military service in the Hellenic Navy, he joined CERTH-ITI in 2019 as a Research Associate and continued as a Postdoctoral Researcher from 2025 onward. He completed his PhD at the same department of D.U.Th. in 2025, specializing in UAVs' control, with a dissertation on motion planning and routing for multi-UAV remote sensing operations. His research interests include robotics, multi-agent systems, UAV path planning, autonomous navigation, remote sensing, AI, and sustainable logistics. He has participated in multiple Horizon Europe, H2020 and national projects, and has published in several international scientific venues.
Manolis Raptis
Senior Researcher
Emmanuel Raptis received his Diploma, Master's, and PhD in Automatic Control and Robotics from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (E.E.C.E) of the Democritus University of Thrace in 2018, 2020 and 2025, respectively. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Information Technologies Institute (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece. Since 2018, he has been working as a Research Associate at CERTH, as a member of the AURA team. During these years, he has participated in several H2020 and National research projects. He has published several research papers, covering topics in Automatic Control, Artificial Intelligence, Reinforcement Learning, UAVs and Decision-Making Systems. His full list of publications is available on Google Scholar.
Dimitris Koutras
Senior Researcher
Dimitrios Koutras earned his Diploma and Ph.D. degrees from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH) in Xanthi, Greece, completing them in 2016 and 2025, respectively. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Information Technologies Institute (CERTH) in Thessaloniki, Greece. Over the years, he has contributed to multiple research and development projects funded by H2020, Horizon Europe, and national programs. His research primarily focuses on robotics, with a particular emphasis on implementing and advancing reinforcement learning techniques for real-world autonomous systems, including UGVs and UAVs.
Post Doctoral Researchers
Despoina Ioakeimidou
Post-doctoral Researcher
Despoina Ioakeimidou holds a Diploma and a Ph.D. in Production and Management Engineering from the Democritus University of Thrace, Greece, and an M.Sc. in Applied Informatics from the University of Macedonia, Greece. Her research interests include data analytics, natural language processing, and intelligent decision support systems. Since 2025, she has been a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) of the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH), Thessaloniki, Greece, and a member of the AURA research team.
PhD Candidates
Thanos Petsanis
PhD Candidate
Thanos Petsanis, born in 1998, graduated from the Department of Electrical and Computers Engineering from the Democritus University of Thrace, majoring in Electronics in 25/07/2022 (registered in 1/9/2016). Integrated Masters is included in the diploma. Henceforth, he carried on as a PhD candidate in DUTH and from December 2022 he joined the AURA team as a research assistant at the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) - CERTH. He holds a C2 Proficiency English certificate. He has been involved in several projects since and his research and work are closely related to fields of Reinforcement Learning, UAVs and 3D modelling.
Stylianos Siomos
PhD Candidate
Stylianos Siomos, born in Kozani in 2001, is an Electrical & Computer Engineering graduate from Democritus University of Thrace (DUTh), specializing in Electronics, with a GPA of 8.83/10. He is particularly interested in Robotics and Reinforcement Learning. Since September 2025, he has been a PhD candidate and a research assistant at the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) - CERTH, where he is a member of the AURA research group.
Ioannis Rallis
PhD Candidate
Ioannis Rallis received his Diploma from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Democritus University of Thrace in 2024. Since 2025, he has been a PhD Candidate in the same Department and has joined the AURA team as a Researcher at the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) of the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH). Since then, he has participated in Horizon Europe and National research projects focusing on the development of technological solutions in the fields of robotics, artificial intelligence, and autonomous systems. His research interests include robotics, multi-agent and intelligent systems, machine learning, reinforcement learning, and adaptive control.
Research Associates
Pavlos Kapoutsis
Senior Researcher Associate
Pavlos Kapoutsis is a Software Engineer with a strong background in designing and developing enterprise software systems, specializing in Java-based architectures, microservices, and cloud-native technologies. He earned his diploma in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, majoring in Computer Science; his diploma thesis focused on the development of a system for managing multi-UAV missions for area coverage. Professionally, he has worked across fintech, banking, IoT, telecommunications, and public-sector environments, contributing to large-scale software systems and internationally deployed IoT solutions. His experience spans system architecture design, backend implementation, database modeling, and frontend development. His technical expertise includes Java, Spring Boot, Hibernate, REST APIs, SQL and NoSQL databases, microservices, Docker, Kubernetes, cloud and messaging technologies, as well as modern frontend frameworks such as React, Angular, and Vue.js.
Konstantinos Angelopoulos
Researcher Associate
Konstantinos Angelopoulos was born in Athens, Greece, in 1995. He earned his diploma in Mechanical Engineering and Aeronautics from the University of Patras in 2020, where his thesis focused on Human-Robot Collaboration for Fabric Folding using RGB-D and Kalman Filters. In 2025, he completed his Master of Science in Data Analysis and Machine Learning at the Hellenic Open University. His research interests span robotics, machine learning, cybersecurity for Industry 4.0, and the development of intelligent systems for human-robot collaboration. He has published in international journals and conferences, with contributions on human-robot collaboration, industrial cybersecurity, and advanced manufacturing technologies. His technical expertise covers modern web technologies, cloud-native architectures, and DevOps practices, with strong proficiency in React, Next.js, Node.js, Java, SQL, Kubernetes, and Azure.
Panagiotis Raptis
Researcher Associate
Panagiotis Raptis received his Diploma from the Department of Agriculture, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in 2022, and his M.Sc. in Genetics, Plant Breeding, and Plant Propagation Material in 2025. His academic work explored various topics in agricultural and environmental sciences, including plant genetics, omics biology, and precision agriculture, with contributions to scientific publications and conferences. Since May 2025, he has been a Research Associate at the Information Technologies Institute (CERTH), as a member of the AURA team. He acts mainly as a project manager, providing scientific and management support across several team's projects.
Anna Vrani
Researcher Associate
Anna Vrani completed her Integrated Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in 2024. She specialized in Industrial Management, focusing on Operational Research, Transportation, and Logistics. She is currently working as a research assistant at the Information Technologies Institute (CERTH) in Thessaloniki, Greece, as a member of the AURA team. Her work focuses on optimizing industrial processes and advancing logistics methodologies through data-driven approaches.
Research Assistant
Alexandra Kiziridou
Researcher Assistant
Alexandra Kiziridou earned her Diploma and Master's degrees from the Department of Civil Engineering at Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH) in Xanthi, Greece, completing them in 2015 and 2017, respectively. During her undergraduate studies, she was engaged in research on the Assessment Of Strengthening Techniques Of Reinforced Concrete Elements Rehabilitated With Composites. She received her Master's Degree in “New Materials and Technologies in Reinforced Concrete Project Design” majoring in “Concrete Technology and Repairs of Structural Projects”. Her research and experimental interests during her postgraduate studies were related to the Mechanical behavior of high-performance concrete using carbon nanotubes and silica gel. Since 2022 she has joined the AURA team as a Researcher at the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) of the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH).
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