5^th Workshop on Maritime Computer Vision (MaCVi)

Benjamin Kiefer (LOOKOUT / University of Tübingen)
Dr. Benjamin Kiefer is a co-founder and CTO of LOOKOUT, a startup aiming to bring autonomy to the recreational boat market by means of the latest computer vision techniques. He was previously a PostDoc at the University of Tuebingen, where he initiated and co-organized the 1st, 2nd and 3rd MaCVi. He led the computer vision team of a large state-funded research project called Avalon, which developed unmanned aerial vehicles for maritime search and rescue. His work has resulted in several publications in the domain of vision aboard UAVs in the maritime context. He has been a teaching assistant for over seven years, teaching lectures in maths, technical informatics and deep learning.

Uma Mudenagudi (KLE Technological University)
Dr. Uma Mudenagudi received her M.Tech. and Ph.D. degrees from IIT Bombay and IIT Delhi, respectively. She is the Dean of Research and Development at KLE Technological University, India, and the Founding Director of the Center for Visual Intelligence (CEVI) Lab. Her research interests span computer vision and visual intelligence, with a focus on image restoration and enhancement, underwater and low-light image analysis, representation learning, multimodal learning, and physics-informed learning. She has led multiple Government of India- and industry-sponsored research projects as Principal Investigator and has published more than 150 papers in reputed international conferences and journals. Her work bridges fundamental and applied research, with an emphasis on developing physics-aware learning and representation methods for real-world visual and multimodal data.

Xiaomin Lin (University of South Florida)
Dr. Xiaomin Lin is an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of South Florida, with affiliated appointments in the Bellini College of AI, Cybersecurity and Computing and the Institute for AI + X. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Maryland under Prof. Yiannis Aloimonos, and directs the ERA Lab (Embodied Robotics and Autonomy), focusing on robotics and multimodal perception for underwater, agricultural, and healthcare applications. As Program Chair, he also leads local coordination for MaCVi @ WACV 2027, including reviewer recruitment, publicity, and speaker invitations.

Chen Chen (University of Central Florida)
Dr. Chen Chen is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Artificial Intelligence, University of Central Florida, and an IEEE Senior Member. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas at Dallas in 2016. His research focuses on multimodal learning, computer vision, and efficient learning systems, spanning large-scale foundation models, human-centric AI, and federated learning, with applications in healthcare, public safety, and agriculture.

Chaitra Desai (MAHE)
Dr. Chaitra Desai is an Assistant Professor at the School of Computer Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), Bengaluru. She received her Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from KLE Technological University, and her research spans computer vision, computational imaging, and physics-informed machine learning, with a focus on underwater vision, physics-based image formation modeling, and image restoration and enhancement in challenging visual environments.

Sneha Varur (KLE Technological University)
Sneha Varur is a Ph.D. scholar in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at KLE Technological University, Hubballi. Prior to academia, she spent over a decade in industry, including as a Service Delivery Specialist at IBM. Her research focuses on deep learning, physics-informed machine learning, and computational imaging, particularly underwater image formation modeling and restoration.

Yi Sheng (University of South Florida)
Dr. Yi Sheng is an Assistant Professor in the USF Bellini College of Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Computing, which she joined in 2025. She received her Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from George Mason University, and her research applies AI to medical technology, developing energy-efficient AI systems for medical applications on resource-constrained edge devices.

Ramesh Ashok Tabib (KLE Technological University)
Dr. Ramesh Ashok Tabib received his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the Center for Visual Intelligence (CEVI), KLE Technological University. He is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering and Director of CEVI, with research interests in representation learning and 2D-3D data creation, and over 12 years of academic research and teaching experience.

Sujatha C (KLE Technological University)
Dr. Sujatha C is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at KLE Technological University, Hubballi. She received her Ph.D. from Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU), Belagavi, and her research spans image and video analysis, machine learning, and multimodal learning with a focus on cognitive tasks, with over 60 papers authored in international conferences and journals.

Tusar Kanti Mishra (MAHE)
Dr. Tusar Kanti Mishra is an Associate Professor at the School of Computer Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), Bengaluru. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from NIT Rourkela and was a recipient of the Erasmus-Mundus research fellowship at the ALICE Lab, University of Groningen. His research interests span pattern recognition, computer vision, and document image analysis, across more than 21 years in academia.