Head

prof. Bożena Kostek

BOŻENA KOSTEK holds professorship at the Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Informatics, Gdansk University of Technology (GUT), Poland. Prof. Kostek is a corresponding member of the Polish Academy of Sciences. She is Head of the Audio Acoustics Laboratory. She worked also as a half-time scientific consultant for the Institute of Physiology and Pathology of Hearing in Warsaw. She is a Fellow of the Audio Engineering Society and a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America.

Bożena Kostek received her M.Sc. degree in Sound Engineering from the Technical University of Gdansk (1983). Following this, she completed her studies at the Institute of Management and Organization and received a second M.Sc. (1986) from the Technical University of Gdansk. As a part of her studies, she pursued her interest in journalism and took some courses in this area. She played piano for a number of years. From 1987-1989, she studied at the Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse, France, receiving DEA d’Acoustique on the scholarship granted by the French Government (and later studied in l’ENTPE, Vaux-en-Velin, and l’INSA Lyon, France). In 1992, she supported her thesis devoted to the quality of the pipe organ control systems and received her Ph.D. degree with honors from the Technical University of Gdansk. In March 2000 she supported her D.Sc. degree at the Institute of Research Systems of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw. In 2005 she was granted the title of professor from the President of Poland. In 2003-2006 she was appointed Vice-Chair of the Multimedia Systems Department.

She led or took part in a number of research projects sponsored by the Polish Ministry of Science and Education, the Polish National Centre for R&D, and the National Science Centre (altogether 42 projects). The subjects of the mentioned projects concern new methods of music recognition based on a soft computing approach, pipe organ control based on fuzzy logic, acoustic sound quality investigations, digital processing algorithms for hearing aids and cochlear implants, and others. She took part in the 6th FP European Project Prestospace devoted to audio and video restoration. She also took part in three EU programs (7th Framework Program) that were realized at the Faculty. Her research activities are interdisciplinary. However, the main research interests focus on cognitive bases of hearing and vision, music information retrieval, musical acoustics, studio technology, Quality-of-Experience, human-computer interaction (HCI), as well as applications of soft computing and computational intelligence to the mentioned domains. She also authored or coauthored some technological solutions (40).

Prof. Kostek has published and presented more than 600 scientific papers in journals, chapters in books, and papers at conferences; she also received several patents (21 patent pending and patents altogether). In 1999, she published a book entitled “Soft Computing in Acoustics,“ and later in 2002, she co-authored a book devoted to “Computer technology applications to audiology and speech therapy.” In 2005 she published another monograph entitled “Perception-based Data Processing in Acoustics.“ Prof. Kostek was also one of the Editors of the first volume of the Transactions of Rough Sets and Guest Editor of the J. Intelligent Information Systems, JAES (J. Audio Eng. Soc.) and J. Acoustical Society of America. She has been an Editorial Committee Board member of the Archives of Acoustics for many years. From 2008 to 2012, she was Editor-in-Chief of Archives of Acoustics (JCR journal). She was a member of the Review Board for the Journal of the Audio Engineering Society, and a reviewer of this journal. She serves as a reviewer of many scientific journals (e.g., IEEE Transactions on Audio, Speech and Language Processing, J. Audio Eng. Soc., J. of Acoustical Society of America, J. of Intelligent Information Systems, J. New Music Research, NCEJ, Neurocomputing, IET Signal Processing, EURASIP JASP, etc.). She was Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Audio Engineering Society (2011-2020). In July 2013 she was appointed as an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transaction on Audio, Speech, and Language and served for three years.

Her teaching responsibilities include classes in psychophysiology of hearing and vision, musical acoustics and informatics, artificial intelligence and soft computing, diagnostics, prosthetics of eyesight and hearing, studio technology, and sound reinforcement. Under her guidance, 25 Ph.D. students supported their doctoral theses (22 with honors). Currently, she is supervising 7 Ph.D. students. Her Ph.D. students received many prestigious awards, i.e., the prize of the President of the Republic of Poland; the prize of the Prime Minister; the prize of the Minister of Science and Higher Education; three 1st prizes of the Foundation for the Development of Radio Communications and Multimedia Technologies; gold, silver and bronze medals obtained in the Student Design competitions at the Audio Engineering Society Conventions; gold, silver and bronze medals received in the Student Recording competitions at the Audio Engineering Society Conventions, best paper awards: KES’2004, IEEE MCSS’2010, IEEE MCSS’2017, OSA’2008, OSA’2010,  ISSET’2013, ISSET’2015, MISSI’2016, GAMBIT’2018, IEEE SPA’2017, IEEE SPA’2019, 1st and 2nd prizes in OSKA ‘2019; best paper award of the Polish Artificial Intelligence Society, AES Foundation Grant, Harman Scholar Educational Grant scholarship, best paper award granted by the Polish Society for Theoretical and Applied Electrical Engineering.

She was the reviewer of 47 Ph.D. theses (among them those from the University of Monash, Melbourne, Ulster University, Singapore, Luleå University of Technology) and 10 habilitation works (for the D.Sc. degree), as well as reviewers for the professorship. In addition, B. Kostek was a reviewer of scientific achievements (Monash University) and a reviewer of professorships in Poland. Under her guidance, many students studied individual programs, and foreign students were given the opportunity to complete their work. She encouraged students to undertake research internships abroad and coordinated students’ participation in scientific events as the Erasmus Plus Faculty Coordinator. So far, she has been the supervisor of over 320 M.Sc. and Eng. diploma works. Many of the M.Sc. works received very valuable prizes (awards granted by firms, e.g., Intel, Philips Consumer Industries Poland, by Scientific societies (Polish Section of the AES, Polish Electrotechnical Society), by Dean of the Faculty, President of the University, as well as by President of Gdansk). The best and most talented continue their careers with doctoral studies.

Her research is performed at the Gdańsk University of Technology, but her scientific efforts have always been aimed at internationalization, as evidenced by numerous foreign contacts, which resulted in European projects, but also invitations to cooperate with the Audio Engineering Society, Acoustical Society of America, and the Rough Set Society. She held important positions in the Audio Engineering Society (AES), the Acoustical Society of America, and the Rough Set Society. She was a member of the AES Board of Governors for 17 years and a member of the AES Executive Committee for 9 years. In 1991, she helped to form the Polish Section of the Audio Engineering Society and, since then, has served as a member of the Committee. She is also a member of the Polish Acoustical Society and of the Acoustical Society of America, she also belongs to other Polish and international scientific societies.

Prof. Bożena Kostek was elected three times as vice president of the Audio Engineering Society for Central Europe ( 2003-2005, 2005-2007, and 2009-2011) and twice as the Governor of the Board of Governors of the AES ( 2007-2009 and 2011-2013).

Prof. Bożena Kostek has been a guest speaker, session, and panel organizer in conferences held in many countries throughout the world. She has chaired or directly contributed to the organization of more than 15 scientific international and local events, including the 138^th Audio Eng. Society Convention in 2015, International Symposia on Sound and Vision Engineering and Mastering, held in Gdansk, PL. She was a member of the team that represented Poland at the European IST (Information Society Technology) events (Nice, France, and Cork, Ireland), as well as she represented Polish scientists in the meetings organized by the National Centre for Research and Development (NCBR, PL) and the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan (MOST) to identify potential areas for collaboration on the topic of ‘Information and Communication Technology’ (ICT).

Prof. Bożena Kostek has been elected to Senior member of the IEEE and the International Rough Set Society.

Prof. Bożena Kostek has received the Certificate of Appreciation in recognition of her service as Associate Editor of IEEE/ACM Transactions on Audio, Speech, and Language Processing (2013-2016).

PRIZES

She is the recipient of many prestigious awards for research, including:

• 1st prize of the Prime Minister of Poland (collaborative, see photo http://www.multimed.org/#) for outstanding scientific and technological achievements, 2015;
• 1st prize of the Prime Minister of Poland (November 2000, see picture) for outstanding research achievements;
• 50th Anniversary Medal of the Polish Section (PS) of the IEEE in recognition of many years of activity, contributing to the development of the Section and expansion of its activities (2022)
• Distinguished Service Medal Award from the Audio Engineering Society (2021)
• In 2013, won the national competition for the Polish Innovation of the Year and received another prize from the Minister of Science and Higher Education.
• the Bachelor Cross of the Polonia Restituta Order (2011);
• Bożena Kostek has been elected as a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences (2013);
• Fellowship of the Audio Engineering Society (2010,see picture);
• Fellowship of the Acoustical Society of America, 2020;
• Citation award received from the Audio Engineering Society, 2013;
• AES Board of Governors award (2015);
• prize of the Minister of Science (2006, see picture, also 2007, 2010, 2012, 2013 – collaborative);
• award of the Polish Academy of Sciences (2005);
• Silver Cross of Merit of the Republic of Poland (2002);
• prize of the Minister of Health (collaborative, 2001);
• award of the Committee for National Education (2001);
• member of the team of the Multimedia Systems Department awarded with the highest prize of the Ministry of Science (so-called “Oscar of Polish Science”) in the category of information technologies in 2003;
• best paper awards, among them: M. Kwiek’s Award for the outstanding scientific presentation from the Acoustical Society of Poland (1996);
• she was awarded a scholarship from Stefan Batory Foundation for the participation in World Automation Congress in Anchorage, Alaska, May 4-9, 1998, where she won the Best paper award;
• Best paper award for her presentations at the Conf. on Knowledge-Based Intelligent Information & Engineering Systems, KES’04, New Zealand, 2004;
• Best paper award for the best papers (M. Pozaryski’s (3rd prize) from the Polish Electrical Society); two awards from the Polish Electrotechnical Society (1992) and (1993);
• 35 awards – given by the President of Gdansk University of Technology for her scientific achievements (1992-2020). B. Kostek also received the honorary diploma for her outstanding scientific achievements from the President of Gdansk University of Technology in 2000;
• member of the team whose projects elaborated were nominated for the Stockholm Challenge Award and the Europrix 2000 prize (Europe’s Best in Multimedia), and awarded gold and silver medals at the international invention exhibitions (2000-2014);
• as a student she acted as the leader of the basketball team that won silver and gold medals at Polish Technical Universities Championships.

Some recent publications