Vincent Becker

Short curriculum vitae

I am a PhD student in the Distributed Systems Group at ETH Zurich under the supervision of Prof. Friedemann Mattern. I joined the group in April 2016. Before, I received both my M.Sc. and B.Sc. in Computer Science from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany. During my studies I stayed at Carnegie Mellon University, US, from October 2013 until February 2014, to compose my Bachelor's thesis. Furthermore, I stayed at LIAAD, INESC TEC in Porto, Portugal, from September 2015 until March 2016 to do my Master's thesis.

Research interests

My research at ETH Zurich focuses in general on machine learning and data mining.

Previously, I worked on estimating potential savings in heating energy using occupancy detection to determine whether a household is occupied.
Now, I am interested in the field of interactions with smart devices. This includes, e.g., object detection from a video stream on mobile devices, gesture-based control of devices, etc.

Learn more about projects

Teaching

HS 2016 Distributed Systems as teaching assistant
FS 2017 Informatik II (D-ITET) as co-head teaching assistant
HS 2017 Distributed Systems as teaching assistant
FS 2018 Informatik II (D-ITET) as head teaching assistant
HS 2018 Informatik I (D-BAUG) as teaching assistant
FS 2019 Informatik II (D-ITET) as head teaching assistant
HS 2019 Informatik II (D-ITET) as head teaching assistant

Available student projects

If you have an idea of your own and you think it fits our research area, please contact me.

Deep Learning for Object Recognition on Mobile Devices

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Supervised student projects

Type	Title	Student	Supervisor	Semester
Assigned Projects
L	Smooth pursuits based on optical flow	Chengyang Wang	Mihai Bâce, Vincent Becker	FS 19
Completed Projects
Type	Title	Student	Supervisor	Semester
M	Dynamic UIs - Building UI elements which are automatically recognized and incorporated in an interaction system	Sandro Kalbermatter	Vincent Becker	HS 18
M	Exploring device control in Augmented Reality	Felix Rauchenstein	Vincent Becker	HS 17
M	Pursuit-based Interaction on Unmodified Devices	Alexander Kayed	Mihai Bâce, Vincent Becker	HS 17
B	Recognizing Snapping and Clapping using Smartwatch Microphones and Accelerometer	Linus Fessler	Vincent Becker	HS 17
B	Multiple finger identification and strength recognition with Myo EMG	Pietro Oldrati	Liliana Barrios, Vincent Becker	HS 17
M	Short Term Load Forecasting	Maximilian Wurm	vcoroama, Vincent Becker	FS 17
M	Deep learning for real-time gaze estimation on mobile devices	Erfan Abdi	Mihai Bâce, Vincent Becker	FS 17
B	Gesture Recognition from EMG using the Myo armband	Chris Mnuk	Vincent Becker	FS 17

Publications

ETH Research Collection Google Scholar ResearchGate GitHub

Vincent Becker, Linus Fessler, Gábor Sörös
GestEar: Combining Audio and Motion Sensing for Gesture Recognition on Smartwatches.
Proceedings of the 2019 International Symposium on Wearable Computers (ISWC 2019). ISWC '19, ACM, ISBN 978-1-4503-6870-4, London, UK, September 2019
doi: 10.1145/3341163.3347735
Abstract, BibTeX
Vincent Becker, Felix Rauchenstein, Gábor Sörös
Connecting and Controlling Appliances through Wearable Augmented Reality.
Augmented Human Research, Springer, August 2019
doi: 10.1007/s41133-019-0019-0
Abstract, BibTeX
Vincent Becker, Felix Rauchenstein, Gábor Sörös
Investigating Universal Appliance Control through Wearable Augmented Reality.
Proceedings of the 10th Augmented Human International Conference. AH '19, ISBN 978-1-4503-6547-5, 2019
doi: 10.1145/3311823.3311853
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
Vincent Becker, Wilhelm Kleiminger, Vlad Coroama, Friedemann Mattern
Estimating the Savings Potential of Occupancy-based Heating Strategies.
Energy Informatics. DACH+ Energieinformatik 2018 Vol. 1, No. 1, Springer, pp. 35–54, October 2018
doi: 10.1186/s42162-018-0022-6
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
Best paper runner-up award
Vincent Becker, Pietro Oldrati, Liliana Barrios, Gábor Sörös
TouchSense: Classifying Finger Touches and Measuring their Force with an Electromyography Armband.
Proceedings of the 2018 International Symposium on Wearable Computers (ISWC 2018). ACM, Singapore, October 2018
doi: 10.1145/3267242.3267250
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
For the code, go to https://github.com/vincentbecker/TouchSense
Vincent Becker
Augmented Humans Interacting with an Augmented World.
Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services (MobileHCI 2018). ACM, pp. 1–2, Barcelona, Spain, September 2018
doi: 10.1145/3236112.3236179
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
Vincent Becker, Wilhelm Kleiminger
Exploring zero-training algorithms for occupancy detection based on smart meter measurements.
Computer Science - Research and Development. DACH+ Energieinformatik 2017 Vol. 33, No. 1, Springer, ISBN 1865-2042, pp. 25–36, February 2018
doi: 10.1007/s00450-017-0344-9
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
This is a postprint version. Please find the published article here.
Vincent Becker, Pietro Oldrati, Liliana Barrios, Gábor Sörös
TouchSense: Classifying and Measuring the Force of Finger Touches with an Electromyography Armband.
Proceedings of the 9th Augmented Human International Conference. AH '18, ISBN 978-1-4503-5415-8, pp. 34:1–34:3, 2018
doi: 10.1145/3174910.3174947
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
Vincent Becker, Wilhelm Kleiminger, Friedemann Mattern
Automatically Estimating the Savings Potential of Occupancy-based Heating Strategies.
pp. 1–47, December 2017
doi: 10.3929/ethz-b-000219545
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
This is a preprint version of an article submitted for publication.
Vincent Becker, Mihai Bâce, Gábor Sörös
Wearable machine learning for recognizing and controlling smart devices.
Proceedings of the Workshop on Object Recognition for Input and Mobile Interaction at the 19th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services (MobileHCI 2017). ACM, pp. 1–3, Vienna, Austria, September 2017
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)
Mihai Bâce, Philippe Schlattner, Vincent Becker, Gábor Sörös
Facilitating Object Detection and Recognition through Eye Gaze.
Proceedings of the Workshop on Object Recognition for Input and Mobile Interaction at the 19th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction with Mobile Devices and Services (MobileHCI 2017). ACM, Vienna, Austria, September 2017
Abstract, BibTeX, Paper (.pdf)

Energy Spotlight Article: Estimating the Savings Potential of Smart Household Thermostats

Former students

Christian Mnuk (now Master's student at ETH)
Erfan Abdi (now at Google Zurich)
Maximilian Wurm (now at Venios GmbH)
Pietro Oldrati (now Master's student at ETH)
Linus Fessler
Felix Rauchenstein (now at infix development GmbH)
Alexander Kayed (now at OneOffix)
Sandro Kalbermatter

Activities

June 2016 - I attended the IfI summer school 2016 in Zurich.
September 2016 - I attended Ubicomp 2016 in Heidelberg.
June 2017 - I attended the UBISS summer school 2017 in Oulu.
September 2017 - I attended MobileHCI 2017 in Vienna.
September 2018 - I attended Augmented Human 2018 in Seoul.
August 2018 - I attended the ACM SIGCHI Summer School on Computational Interaction 2018 in Cambrige, UK.
September 2018 - I attended MobileHCI 2018 in Barcelona.
October 2018 - I attended Ubicomp/ISWC 2018 in Singapore.
October 2018 - I attended Augmented Human 2019 in Reims.
June 2019 - I am going to London for a PhD internship at Google.

Other

I was a reviewer for the IMWUT journal, ISWC 2019, Energieinformatik 2017, ACM SAC 2017 (Data Streams track), the Machine Learning Journal (Springer), ACM SAC 2016, IEEE TKDE, and FCT 2016.