I am a Professor of Electronic and Software Systems at the University of Southampton, and Deputy Head (Research) of the School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS). My research interests are in energy management of mobile/embedded systems and self-powered devices. I am a Senior Member of the IEEE, Member of IET, and Fellow of the HEA.
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Geoff Merrett is Professor of Electronic and Software Systems at the University of Southampton, and Deputy Head (Research) of the School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS). He is a member of the Cyber Physical Systems Research Group and the Centre for Internet of Things (IoT) and Pervasive Systems (having previously Founded and been Head of Centre from 2018-2024). He was Co-Director of the Arm-ECS Research Centre from 2020-2024, an award-winning industrial partnership between ECS and Arm, having served as Technical Manager since 2015. He received the BEng (1st, Hons) and PhD degrees in Electronic Engineering from Southampton in 2004 and 2009 respectively. He was appointed as a Lecturer shortly after, promoted to Associate Professor in 2014, and Professor in 2019. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, a Member of IET, and a Fellow of the HEA.
His research interests are in energy management of mobile/embedded systems and self-powered devices. He has published over 250 papers in these areas, with over 5000 citations, an h-index of 39 and a g-index of 64*1. His papers have received Best Paper awards (IJCAI 2013, ICCES 2017, PECCS 2018, ISTM 2023) and were Best Paper finalists (DATE 2011/15/16, CODES-ISSS 2017, IEEE TCAD). He has given invited talks at leading workshops, conferences and research groups (e.g. DAC, DATE, Arm Research Summit, ETH Zurich). He was a Theme Leader on the £5.6M EPSRC-funded PRiME Programme Grant (EP/K034448/1), Southampton PI on the the £1.2M EPSRC International Centre for Spatial Computational Learning (EP/S030069/1) and £1.3M EPSRC ‘Graceful’ many-core computing project (EP/L000563/1), Deputy Director of a £1.4M EPSRC Platform Grant on Smart Cities (EP/P010164/1), and a Co-I on both the EPSRC Holistic Energy Harvesting project (EP/G067740/1) and the EPSRC Energy Harvesting Network (EP/H013458/1).
Professor Merrett has served on the EPSRC Strategic Advisory Team (SAT) for the ICT theme since 2019, advising EPSRC on new research areas and strategy. He is a member of the eFutures Steering Group (an EPSRC-funded network representing the UK’s electronic systems academic community), having previously served on its ECR Steering Group, and co-manages the UK’s Energy Harvesting Network (co-organising its annual event from 2011-2016). He is a member of EPSRC College and the UKRI FLF Panel College, serving as Chair of a number of prioritisation and interview panels, and has also reviewed proposals for Italy’s Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (serving on REPRISE, the Register of Expert Peer-Reviewers for Italian Scientific Evaluation) and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research: Domain Applied and Engineering Sciences. He is an active reviewer for a number of prestigious international journals, and serves on a number of TPCs for international conferences (e.g. Track Chair at DATE2022). He was Program Co-Chair of the IEEE International Conference on Omni-layer Intelligent Systems (COINS) 2024 conference, and a founder of the International Workshop on Energy Neutral Sensing Systems (ENSsys, co-located with the ACM SenSys conference), serving as General Chair from 2013-15, and on its steering/organisation committees since 2016. He is a member of the Editorial Board for MDPI Sensors, and previously served as an Associate Editor for IET Circuits, Devices and Systems and IET Computers and Digital Techniques. He has been guest editor for special issues on IoT and Big Data, Energy-Neutral IoT Devices, Wearable Smart Devices, and Electronics Education. He co-edited the IET book on Many Core Computing: Hardware and Software, containing 22 chapters contributed by leading international researchers.
He currently leads a team of
11 PhD students, having previously graduated 27 PhD students and line-managed 26 research staff and 30 interns. The quality of his PhD students has been externally recognised, for example winning the University's 3 Minute Thesis competition in 2015, receiving Silver at SET for Britain 2015, receiving the Gold Medal at Malaysia's Innovation Technology Expo 2016-17, and winning the Best of Faculty award at the University's Festival of Doctoral Research 2019. He has been external examiner for 20 PhD theses, including students at Imperial College London, ETH Zurich, TU Delft, TU Dresden, Bologna, Birmingham, Coventry, Liverpool, Newcastle, and York.
Professor Merrett is External Examiner of Undergraduate and Postgraduate Degrees in Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Newcastle University, having previously served as External Examiner at the University of York (MSc Embedded Wireless Systems and MSc Digital Systems Engineering programmes) from 2018-2022. He was General Chair of the 11th European Workshop on Microelectronics Education (EWME) in 2016, where he also published a paper on the use of innovative online lectures (for which he received funding from the National HESTEM Programme, and a VC Teaching Award in 2011). He has been Branch Counsellor of the University’s IEEE Student Branch since 2010, and received the IEEE R8 ‘Outstanding Counsellor’ award in 2013. He has been Southampton’s academic representative for the UK Electronics Skills Foundation (UKESF) since 2011, a collaboration between industry and universities which, alongside promoting a career in electronics, provides scholarships, summer employment and industrial mentoring to undergraduates. In 2016 he was invited to join the UKESF’s Strategic Advisory Group, and helped to guide activities, took part in a roundtable discussion with government ministers on the engineering skills gap, and presented at their 5-year celebration event and the TechWorks Industry Summit 2018.
At Southampton, he leads and teaches on a number of well-received lecture, lab, and project based modules. In 2021, he was shortlisted for a Southampton University Student's Union award for Most Engaging Lecturer. He has a Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (University of Southampton, 2011, has supervised 163 UG/PGT project students, and continually seeks to improve his teaching. He led on the creation of a new MSc Internet of Things (IoT) degree programme at Southampton, uniquely designed to recruit students from both EEE and computing backgrounds. He has designed substantial educational material and delivered it to UG/PGT students, college teachers and students, and academic/industrial researchers. Internationally, he played a key role in the launch of the EEE degree at the University’s Malaysia campus, teaching there for two weeks every year from 2013-17.
Professor Merrett previously served as Senior Admissions Tutor for ECS' EEE degree programmes, as subsequently as Director of Outreach and Recruitment in the Department until 2022. In this role, he oversaw major projects for ECS’ public website, created ECS’ first outreach strategy, and led on a number of significant outreach projects (e.g. launching and leading the annual ECS Summer Taster Courses from 2014-2022, which were nominated for a VC Teaching Award in 2017, and the A-Level Electronic Engineering Teaching Kits, which received a VC Teaching Award in 2019). He has served as a Co-Opted Governor at Sarisbury Infant School since 2021.
Geoff Merrett is Professor of Electronic and Software Systems at the University of Southampton, and Deputy Head (Research) of the School of Electronics and Computer Science. He received the BEng and PhD degrees from Southampton in 2004 and 2009 respectively. He was appointed as a Lecturer shortly after, promoted to Associate Professor in 2014, and Professor in 2019. His research interests are in energy management of mobile/embedded systems and self-powered devices, and he has published over 250 papers in these areas. He has received a number of Best Paper awards and nominations, and he has given invited talks at leading workshops, conferences and research groups. His research has been supported by EPSRC projects including the International Centre for Spatial Computational Learning, Platform Grant on Smart Cities, PRiME Programme Grant, Graceful project, and Holistic Energy Harvesting project.
He has served on the EPSRC Strategic Advisory Team (SAT) for the ICT theme since 2019, the eFutures Steering Group, and co-manages the UK’s Energy Harvesting Network. He is a member of EPSRC College and the UKRI FLF Panel College, and also reviews proposals for national funders in Italy and the Netherlands. He is an active reviewer for a number of prestigious international journals and conferences, is Associate Editor for MDPI Sensors, was an previously an Associate Editor for IET CDT, and a guest editor for numerous special issues. He co-edited the IET book on Many Core Computing: Hardware and Software, was Program Co-Chair of IEEE COINS 2024 conference, General Chair of EWME 2016, and was a founder of the ENSsys workshop (co-located with ACM SenSys since 2013), serving as General Chair from 2013-15, and on its steering/organisation committees since 2016.
Professor Merrett currently leads a team of 11 PhD students, and has successfully graduated 27 PhD students. He is Director of Outreach and Recruitment in ECS, and has led on a number of significant outreach projects including the ECS Summer Taster Courses and A-Level Electronic Engineering Teaching Kits, the latter of which received a VC Teaching Award in 2019. He is an MSc External Examiner at Newcastle University of, and serves on the UK Electronics Skills Foundation's Strategic Advisory Group. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, a Member of IET, and a Fellow of the HEA.
*1 Disclaimer: This information was correct in September 2024, but will likely have changed since!