Members

Our group, despite its relatively small size, is very focused, and consists of creative and talented students. We aim to address issues relevant to the biomedical community by Bringing Intelligence to Pixels.

Group leader

Email: rferrari@ufscar.br

Room: G06

Phone: +55 (16) 3306-6607

Lab: BIP-Lab

Ricardo José Ferrari, PhD - Associate Professor

Ricardo J. Ferrari obtained his degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of São Paulo (USP), São Carlos, Brazil, in 1995. He later earned his M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the same institution in 1998 and 2002, respectively. During his Ph.D., he received a prestigious Brazilian scholarship to undertake the experimental part of his research at the University of Calgary (UofC), Canada, where he contributed to the development of medical image processing algorithms for breast cancer detection from 1999 to 2000. From 2004 to 2005, Ricardo served as an Associate Researcher specializing in medical image analysis at the University of Alberta (UofA). Subsequently, between 2007 and 2008, he was affiliated with Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto.

In addition to his academic pursuits, Ricardo has held positions with prominent medical technology companies in Canada, including Imaging Dynamics Company Ltd and Z-Tech Company. Since 2013, he has been a faculty member in the Department of Computing (DC) at the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), São Carlos, SP, Brazil, where he became a Full Professor this year. His research focuses on multidimensional signal processing, computer vision, and machine learning. Currently, his research endeavors are directed towards developing computer-aided detection and diagnosis systems for neurodegenerative disorders such as Multiple Sclerosis and Alzheimer's disease.

As for his scientific contributions to the community, Ricardo has recently taken on a new role as an Associate Editor for Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience. He has also been an active reviewer for other highly reputable journals and conferences such as Expert Systems with Applications, Pattern Recognition, Pattern Recognition Letters, and Computers in Biology and Medicine, among others.

PhD Students

Paulo Matheus Girardi

(CAPES scholarship)

Paulo holds a Master's degree in Electrical Engineering from UFSCar (2023) and a specialization in Physics Teaching from PRISMA College (2021). He also earned an MBA in Software Engineering (2020) and a bachelor's degree in Control and Automation Engineering (2017). Currently, he is a Doctoral Student in the Computer Science Postgraduate Program at UFSCar, with research interests in Pattern Recognition, Data Analysis, Machine Learning, Image Processing, and Computer Vision. His PhD project is on "Graph analysis of sequential MRI for predicting the progression of MCI to AD".

Email: paulogirardi@estudante.ufscar.br

Marco Antonio Bernardi Grivol

(CAPES scholarship)

Marco holds a B.Sc. (2022), an M.Sc. (2025), and is currently a Ph.D. student in Computer Science at UFSCar. His research focuses on neuroimaging, computer vision, machine learning, medical image processing, and network neuroscience. After studying interhemispheric hippocampal asymmetries in Alzheimer's disease via structural MRI during his Master's, his Ph.D. investigates anatomically grounded structural covariance networks using diffusion MRI tractography to characterize topological alterations and interhemispheric asymmetries across Alzheimer's stages.

Email: marcogrivol@estudante.ufscar.br

MSc Students

Adriano de Souza Bastos

Adriano Bastos holds a postgraduate degree in Software Engineering from the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar) (2020) and a Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Sorocaba (UNISO) (2016). He is currently enrolled in a Master's degree in Computer Vision and the title of his research project is "Análise Radiométrica da Assimetria Inter-Hemisférica com Foco na Doença de Alzheimer".

Email: adrianobastos@estudante.ufscar.br

Filipe de Jesus Neves

Filipe Neves received his B.S. in Computer Information Systems from the Pontifical Catholic University of Campinas in 2023. He is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Computer Science at the Federal University of São Carlos (DC-UFSCar). His research focuses on the exploratory clustering of harmonized medial temporal MRI features to evaluate clinical and visual concordance in the ADNI dataset.

Email: filipe@estudante.ufscar.br

Italo Antonio Duarte de Oliveira

Italo Oliveira earned his B.S. in Computer Engineering from UFSCar in 2022, completing undergraduate research in Alzheimer's diagnosis and intravital microscopy. Currently a Master's student, his research uses convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and vision transformers (ViTs) to predict the progression from MCI to Alzheimer's disease.

Email: italo@estudante.ufscar.br

Marco Aurélio Daniel

Marco Aurélio Daniel earned his B.S. in Computer Engineering (2018) and a Specialization in AI (2020) from FACENS. Currently a Master's student in Computer Science at UFSCar, his research centers on small white matter lesion segmentation in 3D FLAIR MRI using Swin UNETR, with broader research interests in medical image processing and deep learning.

Email: marco.daniel@estudante.ufscar.br

Carlos Henrique Porto Carvalho

(CAPES scholarship)

Carlos holds a B.S. in Physics Education from UFMT (2024) and is an M.Sc. student in Computer Science at DC-UFSCar (2026). His research focuses on applying 3D Zernike Descriptors to Monogenic Phase Congruency Maps for longitudinal characterization of local anatomical geometry in structural brain MRI.

Email: carlosporto@estudante.ufscar.br

Vinícius Henrique de Proença Cavalcanti

Vinícius Cavalcanti, a CS Master’s student at UFSCar (medical brain imaging) with engineering degrees from UniFACENS (2022, 2025), conducts research in computer vision and automotive AI. He works on camera/LiDAR ADAS and perception systems for Conecta 2030, as well as AI-driven driving-pattern analysis for Ford’s PACE project. His research project is "to be defined".

Email: vinicius.cavalcanti@estudante.ufscar.br

Diogo Nunes Carvalho

Diogo Nunes Carvalho holds a Bachelor's degree in Control and Automation Engineering from the Federal University of Lavras (UFLA, 2025). He is currently enrolled in a Master's degree in Computer Science in the Department of Computing at the Federal University of São Carlos (DC-UFSCar), with a research project focused on Facial Privacy Protection. His research is conducted in partnership with the company Único ID.

Email: diogocarvalho@estudante.ufscar.br

BSc Students

João Luis Ramos Defendi Vignoli

(FAPESP scholarship)

João is currently enrolled in a Bachelor degree in Computer Engineering in the Department of Computing at the Federal University of São Carlos (DC-UFSCAR). The title of his research project is "Steerable Monogenic Phase Congruency 3D para
Suporte à Análise Anatômica Local em Imagens de
Ressonância Magnética Cerebral".

Email: jlrdvignoli@estudante.ufscar.br