From 2005 to 2015, I worked on various commercial software projects (with the exception of the year 2013 when I stepped away from computing to collaborate in a government agency).

After obtaining a six-year degree in Computer Science from the University of Buenos Aires in 2012, and missing the academic world, I returned in 2014 as an assistant professor for the Operating Systems course. A year later, I decided to fully dedicate myself to research and joined CONICET (the National Scientific and Technical Research Council of Argentina) as a fellow in the Ph.D. program in Computer Science at the University of Buenos Aires.

The two main areas of my interest are artificial intelligence and neuroscience, particularly probabilistic programming and its application in learning. That's why I became a part of the Integrative Neuroscience Lab and the Applied Artificial Intelligence Lab.

On 2017, I spent three months visiting Josh Tenenbaum's Computational Cognitive Science lab at MIT to deepen my knowledge of recent advances in cognitive modeling. In 2018, I was awarded the Facebook Emerging Scholar Award for my doctoral work, and in 2021, I obtained my Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Buenos Aires.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, in May 2020, I decided to collaborate with CONICET as the Manager of the Technology Transfer Office. I reconstructed the TTO team across the country, collaborated in bringing solutions to address the health crisis, and later worked on coordinating the capabilities and technologies of CONICET with businesses, public entities, and society in general. This was aimed at advancing science and technology, contributing to the country's development and improving the quality of life for the population.

Education

2015-2020

Ph.D. in Computer Science. University of Buenos Aires.
With a scolarship from CONICET (the National Scientific and Technical Research Council of Argentina)
Doctoral advisors: Mariano Sigman and Santiago Figueria
Thesis: Language of thought models and techniques for machine learning from sparse data

2005-2012

Six-year degree in Computer Science. University of Buenos Aires.
Thesis: Random genaration in humans: a computational model

2002

First Certificate in English. University of Cambridge.
FSOL Examination

Teaching

2017-2020

Adjunct Senior Lecturer at Operating Systems.
Department of Computer Science, FCEyN, University of Buenos Aires.

2014-2017

Adjunct Lecturer at Operating Systems.
Department of Computer Science, FCEyN, University of Buenos Aires.

2007-2012

Volunteer, Professor and Director. Computer Literacy project for vulnerable neighborhoods.
Funded by University of Buenos Aires.

Research

Labs

Applied Artificial Intelligence Lab

The AAIL is an interdisciplinary environment, which combines different aspects from Computational Neuroscience, as complexity and randomness perception in humans, computational linguistics, data mining in big text corpus and source code, interactive dialogue systems, speech recognition and real-time analysis of brain signals.

Integrative Neuroscience Lab

The INL is an interdisciplinary group integrated by physicists, psychologists, biologists, engineers, educational and biotechnology scientists, linguists, mathematicians, artists and computer scientists.

The group has wide interests in neuroscience and experimental psychology. Over the last years we developed an empirical and theoretical approach to decision making, with special focus on the assemblage of unitary decisions into mental programs and understanding the construction of confidence and subjective beliefs. Many aspects of our investigation rely on data mining and computational tools on massive corpus of human behavior (text, decision making...). Several members of the group have over the last years developed lines of research to understand how current knowledge of the brain and the mind may serve to improve educational practice. Many of the projects conducted are developed at schools throughout the country and these investigations on cognitive development are being extended to hundreds of thousands of children through the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) framework.

Publications

2021

Abriola S, Tano P, Romano S, Figuera S A logical framework to study concept-learning biases in the presence of multiple explanations Behav Res (2021).

2021

Planton S, van Kerkoerle T, Abbih L, Maheu M, Meyniel F, Sigman M, Wang L, Figueria S, Romano S, Dehaene S. A theory of memory for binary sequences: Evidence for a mental compression algorithm in humans PLoS computational biology 17 (1), e1008598.

2020

Tano P, Romano S, Sigman M, Salles A, Figueira S. Towards a more flexible Language of Thought: Bayesian grammar updates after each concept exposure Phys. Rev. E 101 (4), 042128.

2018

Romano S, Salles A, Amalric M, Dehaene S, Sigman M, Figueira S. Bayesian validation of grammar productions for the language of thought. PLOS ONE 13(7): e0200420.

2013

Romano S, Sigman M. y Figueira S. LT2C2: A Language of Thought with Turing-Computable Kolmogorov Complexity. Papers in Physics. Vol. 5

Projects

2012-2015 2012-2015

Applications of the Theory of Algorithmic Randomness – GLyC - Logic, Language and Computability Research Group, Department of Computer Science, FCEyN, University of Buenos Aires. Funding: University of Buenos Aires (UBACyT 20020110100025). Role: Student.

2011-2014 2011-2014

Applications of the Theory of Algorithmic Randomness – GLyC - Logic, Language and Computability Research Group, Department of Computer Science, FCEyN, University of Buenos Aires. Funding: SECyT-Argentinean Secretariat for Science and Technology (PICT-2011-0365). Role: Student.

2004-2005 2004-2005

Robot Soccer (Simurosot - FIRA). Center for Advanced Studies in Information Technology (CAETI). Interamerican Open University (UAI). Role: Student