ELLIS Unit Grenoble Inaugural Event
Key info
When: December 8th, 2026 – full day.
When: Amphithéâtre Louis Néel, Bâtiment Ampère (GrenobleINP, UGA)
Registration is free, but mandatory, request your spot using this link.
(You can also propose presenting a poster at the event via the registration form.)
List of Speakers
(Please, see the talks details below)
Serge Belongie, University of Copenhagen, ELLIS President
Dima Damen, University of Bristol, ELLIS Fellow
Justin Carpentier, Inria, ELLIS Unit Paris
Mirco Ravanelli, Concordia University
Laura Sevilla, University of Edinburgh, ELLIS Scholar
Hayley Hung, TU Delft, ELLIS Fellow
Programme (tentative)
09:00 — Opening
09:45 — Serge Belongie: Challenges in Fine-Grained Image Analysis
10:30 — Group Picture
10:45 — Coffee Break
11:15 — Mirco Ravanelli
12:00 — Dima Damen
12:45 — Lunch Break
14:15 — Laura Sevilla
15:00 — Hayley Hung
15:45 — Coffee Break + Poster Session
16:30 — Justin Carpentier
17:15 — Closing
Details of the talks
Serge Belongie: Challenges in Fine-Grained Image Analysis
Abstract: Fine-grained image analysis (FGIA) is a longstanding and fundamental problem in computer vision and pattern recognition, underpinning a diverse set of real-world applications. The task of FGIA concerns visual objects from subordinate categories, e.g., species of birds or models of cars. Capitalizing on advances in Large Vision-Language Models (LVLMs), in recent years we have witnessed remarkable progress on a variety of FGIA problems. In this talk we review representative examples in the context of recognition and retrieval alongside other key issues such as publicly available benchmark datasets, domain-specific applications, and connections with other modalities including text and audio. We conclude by highlighting several research directions and open problems.
Bio: Serge Belongie is a professor of Computer Science at the University of Copenhagen, where he also serves as the head of the Pioneer Centre for Artificial Intelligence (P1). Previously, he was a professor of Computer Science at Cornell University, an Associate Dean at Cornell Tech, a member of the Visiting Faculty program at Google, and a professor of Computer Science & Engineering at UC San Diego. His research interests include Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Augmented Reality, and Human-in-the-Loop Computing. He is also a co-founder of several companies including Digital Persona and Anchovi Labs.
He is a recipient of the NSF CAREER Award, the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, the MIT Technology Review “Innovators Under 35” Award, the Stibitz-Wilson Award, the Helmholtz Prize, the Everingham Prize, and the Koenderink Prize for fundamental contributions to the Computer Vision community. He is a member of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters and serves as President of the board of the European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems (ELLIS).
Micro Ravanelli: Speech Representations in the Era of LLMs
Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) are transforming conversational AI, enabling systems that can listen, understand, and respond naturally through speech. In this talk, I will explore how speech representations have evolved and why they play a crucial role in modern AI systems. I will then highlight key challenges and present recent advances from our research toward more efficient, compact, and controllable speech representations for the next generation of conversational AI.
Bio: Mirco Ravanelli is an Associate Professor at Concordia University and an Associate Member of Mila – Quebec AI Institute. His research focuses on deep learning and Conversational AI, with particular emphasis on speech processing, representation learning, multimodality, and interpretability. He has authored over 100 publications in machine learning and speech processing venues and has received several international awards for his research. He founded and leads SpeechBrain, one of the most widely adopted open-source toolkits for speech and conversational AI, used by researchers and practitioners worldwide. His recent research explores speech tokenization, multimodal LLMs, and efficient foundation models for audio and speech.
Find out more about the event on this website.
Learn more about the ELLIS Unit Grenoble here.
