Sotiris Ntouskas

About

I am a Mechanical Engineer and Research Engineer, currently working at CERTH on research and development projects involving energy systems and scientific software.

My research interests lie primarily in control engineering and artificial intelligence, with a particular interest in model predictive control, system identification, physics-informed machine learning, optimization, and embedded/edge AI. I am especially interested in approaches that combine physical models with data-driven methods and in their application to real-world dynamical systems.

My work has spanned control and optimization, machine learning, signal processing, embedded systems, scientific software development, and energy applications. I particularly enjoy problems that sit at the intersection of mechanical, electrical, and software engineering, connecting mathematical modelling and algorithms with physical systems and experimental data.

Selected Work

GitHub pull request adding timed watering support for the SONOFF SWV

Open PR · Upstream Review

Open-Source Development for Home Assistant

SONOFF SWV · Zigbee / ZHA

Contributing to the Home Assistant open-source ecosystem through device integration development. Current work adds timed watering support for the SONOFF SWV Zigbee irrigation valve, using device-side timing to allow autonomous valve operation without requiring Home Assistant to remain available.

The contribution includes new Home Assistant entities, Zigbee command handling, testing with physical hardware, automated tests and project quality checks.

Python Home Assistant Zigbee ZHA Testing

View Pull Request

Measured and model-predicted indoor temperature for a residential thermal model

Research Project · Ongoing

Thermal Modelling & System Identification

Residential Thermal Digital Twin

Development of a residential thermal digital twin using real indoor and outdoor measurements collected through Home Assistant. The project combines physical modelling, system identification and data-driven methods to model indoor temperature dynamics and evaluate thermal behaviour.

Current work explores first-order thermal models, parameter estimation, multi-step prediction and physics-informed machine learning, with the longer-term objective of integrating the models into model-based control and MPC.

Python System Identification Thermal Modelling PINNs MPC

View Repository Read Article

GUI for automated assay execution, real-time sensor acquisition and pump and valve control

Custom electronics and Raspberry Pi instrumentation for a Lab-on-Chip experimental platform

Fluid flow through the channels of a microfluidic Lab-on-Chip device

Research & Experimental Development

Integrated Instrumentation for Lab-on-Chip Systems

Microfluidics · Embedded Systems · Automated Assays

Development of custom instrumentation for Lab-on-Chip platforms integrating nanosensors and microfluidics for biological and environmental sensing applications. The systems supported research projects targeting pathogen detection in biological samples and heavy-metal and pollutant detection in environmental water samples.

My work covered the software, electronic and mechanical infrastructure required to operate the complete experimental platform, including real-time sensor acquisition and visualization, automated assay execution, pump and valve control, custom Raspberry Pi interfacing electronics, remote data transmission, and mechanical design and fabrication of the experimental assemblies.

Python Raspberry Pi Embedded Systems Electronics Microfluidics GUI Software Development

Publications

Petridis, S., Giourka, P., Ntouskas, S., et al. (2026). Temporal resolution matters: a comparative life cycle assessment with energy balancing using real, annual, and disaggregated data. Energy and Buildings, 362, 117543.
Skotadis, E., Tsigkourakos, M., Anthoulakis, E., Filippidou, M. K., Ntouskas, S., et al. (2026). Development of Advanced Nanobiosensors and a Portable Monitoring System for Pesticide Detection at the Point of Need. Biosensors, 16(2), 109.
Filippidou, M. K., Kanaris, A. I., Aslanidis, E., Rapesi, A., Tsounidi, D., Ntouskas, S., et al. (2023). Integrated plastic microfluidic device for heavy metal ion detection. Micromachines, 14(8), 1595.
Charalampides, M., Bozios, T., Tsoukalas, D., Ntouskas, S., Chatzandroulis, S., Skotadis, E., et al. (2023). Advanced Edge to Cloud system architecture for Smart Real-Time water quality monitoring using cutting-edge portable IoT biosensor devices. 2023 International Conference on Smart Applications, Communications and Networking (SmartNets), pp. 1–6.
Ntouskas, S., & Sarimveis, H. (2021). A robust model predictive control framework for the regulation of anesthesia process with Propofol. Optimal Control Applications and Methods, 42(4), 965–986.
Ntouskas, S., Sarimveis, H., & Sopasakis, P. (2018). Model predictive control for offset-free reference tracking of fractional order systems. Control Engineering Practice, 71, 26–33.
Herceg, D., Ntouskas, S., Sopasakis, P., Dokoumetzidis, A., Macheras, P., Sarimveis, H., & Patrinos, P. (2017). Modeling and administration scheduling of fractional-order pharmacokinetic systems. IFAC-PapersOnLine, 50(1), 9742–9747.
Sopasakis, P., Ntouskas, S., & Sarimveis, H. (2015). Robust model predictive control for discrete-time fractional-order systems. 2015 23rd Mediterranean Conference on Control and Automation (MED), pp. 384–389.
Ντούσκας, Σ., Αναγνωστοπούλου, Ε., Σαρίμβεης, Χ., & Σωπασάκης, Π. (2015). Διαδικτυακή εφαρμογή για την προσομοίωση της κινητικής και τον προσδιορισμό της βέλτιστης δοσολογίας φαρμάκων. 10ο Πανελλήνιο Συνέδριο Χημικής Μηχανικής, 4–6 Ιουνίου 2015.

Experience

Professional Experience

2023 – Present

CERTH

Research Engineer

Research and software development for energy systems, building energy performance and data-driven applications within European R&D projects.

2019 – 2023

NCSR Demokritos

Research Engineer

Software/hardware development, mechanical and experimental system design, signal processing and embedded data analysis for sensor and microdevice applications.

2016 – 2019

Teletel S.A.

Software Engineer

Software development and testing for ground and on-board systems supporting European Space Agency (ESA) missions, including Euclid and JUICE.

2014 – 2015

National Technical University of Athens

Research Engineer

Unit of Process Control & Informatics

Research on model predictive control and optimization, with applications to drug administration and pharmacokinetic systems.

Teaching Experience

2021 – 2023

New York College · School of Informatics

Instructor / Lecturer

Teaching in computational thinking, algorithms, programming and analytical problem solving.

Courses: Fundamentals of Programming · Introduction to Software Development · Data Structures and Algorithms · Software Testing Processes · Contemporary Problem Analysis

Thesis supervision: Undergraduate thesis on databases for handling online big data in the Greek Food & Beverage sector.

Sotiris Ntouskas

Research Engineer · Control · Machine Learning

About

Selected Work

Open-Source Development for Home Assistant

Thermal Modelling & System Identification

Integrated Instrumentation for Lab-on-Chip Systems

Publications

Experience

Professional Experience

CERTH

NCSR Demokritos

Teletel S.A.

National Technical University of Athens

Teaching Experience

New York College · School of Informatics

Contact