Dr. Elena Gavagnin

Work at ZHAW

Position

• Co-Head of Information Systems and Technologies
• Senior Lecturer and Project Leader for Data Science

Focus

• Machine Learning
• Predictive Analytics
• Computational Astrophysics

Teaching

Senior Lecturer and Project Leader for Data Science

Experience

• Business Intelligence Data Scientist
  SWISS Intl. Air Lines
  11 / 2017 - 09 / 2019
• Teaching Assistant
  University of Zurich
  01 / 2013 - 02 / 2017

Education and Continuing education

Education

• PhD / Institute of Computational Science
  University of Zurich
  01 / 2013 - 02 / 2017
• MSc / Astrophysics
  Università degli Studi di Bologna
  09 / 2010 - 12 / 2012
• BSc / Physics
  Università degli Studi di Bologna
  09 / 2007 - 12 / 2010

Continuing Education

CAS Higher and Professional Education
Zurich University of Applied Sciences
07 / 2021

Network

Membership of networks

• SKACH
• Alumni Association of Collegio Superiore, University of Bologna

ORCID digital identifier

ORCID ID: 0000-0001-5146-3759

Projects

• AI-Accelerated Radiative Transfer Simulations for SKAO / Project leader / ongoing
• Square Kilometre Array: Mock-observations via generative deep learning (GenAI4SKA) / Project leader / ongoing
• Multimodal Detection of Toxicity in Video Games / Project leader / completed
• ERZ-SmartAssistant / Project leader / completed
• Multimodal Anonymization of Gameplay Data / Project leader / completed
• Transforming clinical assessments: Explicitly articulating implicit clinical decision-making to train AI / Team member / completed
• Intent detection in citizen-based damage reporting systems / Project leader / completed
• Tele-Assessment: Leveraging Deep Learning to Assess Upper Limb Kinematics after Stroke with Off-the-shelf Webcams / Team member / completed
• Square Kilometre Array: Mock-observations via generative deep learning / Project leader / completed
• Digital Companion / Team member / completed
• Dynamic pricing against food waste in university catering facilities / Project leader / completed
• Acceptance of an app for contact-tracing of SARS-CoV-2 in the Swiss population / Team member / completed
• Gamification: A browser-based Tool for Experiments / Team member / completed

Publications

Articles in scientific journal, peer-reviewed

• Denzel, P., Billeter, Y., Schilling, F.-P., & Gavagnin, E. (2026). Galactic alchemy : deep learning map-to-map translation in hydrodynamical simulations. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stag155
• Unger, T., Kühnis, B., Sauerzopf, L., Spiess, M. R., de Spindler, A., Luft, A. R., Easthope Awai, C., Schönhammer, J. G., & Gavagnin, E. (2025). Using deep learning to detect upper limb compensation in individuals post-stroke using consumer-grade webcams : a feasibility study. Frontiers in Medicine, 12(1645369). https://doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2025.1645369
• Unger, T., de Sousa Ribeiro, R., Mokni, M., Weikert, T., Pohl, J., Schwarz, A., Held, J. P. O., Sauerzopf, L., Kühnis, B., Gavagnin, E., Luft, A. R., Gassert, R., Lambercy, O., Awai Easthope, C., & Schönhammer, J. G. (2024). Upper limb movement quality measures : comparing IMUs and optical motion capture in stroke patients performing a drinking task. Frontiers in Digital Health, 6(1359776). https://doi.org/10.3389/fdgth.2024.1359776
• Sauerzopf, L., Chavez Panduro, C. G., Luft, A., Kühnis, B., Gavagnin, E., Unger, T., Easthope Awai, C., Schönhammer, J. G., Degenfellner, J., & Spiess, M. (2024). Evaluating inter- and intra-rater reliability in assessing upper limb compensatory movements post-stroke : creating a ground truth through video analysis? Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation, 21(217). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12984-024-01506-7
• Schilling, F.-P., Flumini, D., Füchslin, R. M., Gavagnin, E., Geller, A., Quarteroni, S., & Stadelmann, T. (2022). Foundations of Data Science : a comprehensive overview formed at the 1st International Symposium on the Science of Data Science. Archives of Data Science, Series A, 8(2). https://doi.org/10.5445/IR/1000146422

Book chapters, peer-reviewed

Gavagnin, E. (2025). AI for architects. In A. Gerber, O. Atalay Franck, & M. Mieskes (Eds.), Architectural intelligence in the age of artificial intelligence (pp. 29–36). Transcript. https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839430699

Written conference contributions, peer-reviewed

• Heierli, J., Bahar Ganjineh, R., & Gavagnin, E. (2025). Evaluating LLM capabilities in low-resource contexts : a case study of Persian linguistic and cultural tasks (E. L. Estevanell-Valladares, A. Picazo-Izquierdo, T. Ranasinghe, B. Mikaberidze, S. Ostermann, D. Gurgurov, P. Müller, K. Micallef, C. Borg, M. Gregor, & M. Simko, Eds.; pp. 111–120) [Conference paper]. Incoma. https://doi.org/10.26615/978-954-452-100-4-012
• Heierli, J., Gavagnin, E., Wu, W., Händler-Schuster, D., Dolata, M., Schwabe, G., & de Spindler, A. (2025). From conversation to agent : LLM-driven design of structured healthcare agents [Conference paper]. Procedia Computer Science, 272, 269–276. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2025.10.205
• Mladenov, P., Heierli, J., de Spindler, A., & Gavagnin, E. (2025). Missing pieces : how humans and GPT-4.1 detect absence and predict the unseen [Conference paper]. Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop on MLLM for Unified Comprehension and Generation, 9–13. https://doi.org/10.1145/3746276.3760466
• Sauerzopf, L., Schweizer, C., Luft, A., Kühnis, B., Gavagnin, E., Unger, T., Easthope Awai, C., Schönhammer, J. G., Degenfellner, J., & Spiess, M. (2025, May 13). Toward ground truth : evaluating therapists’ reliability in video-based assessment of upper limb compensatory movements post-stroke. RehabWeek, Chicago, USA, 12-16 May 2025.
• Unger, T., Weikert, T., Mokni, M., Luft, A., Gassert, R., Lambercy, O., Sauerzopf, L., Gavagnin, E., Kühnis, B., Spiess, M., Schönhammer, J., & Awai Easthope, C. (2024). Quantifying upper limb movement quality after stroke with a webcam. 13th World Congress for Neurorehabilitation, Vancouver, Canada, 22-25 May 2024.
• Chavez Panduro, C. G., Spiess, M., Gavagnin, E., Kühnis, B., Unger, T., Schönhammer, J., & Sauerzopf, L. (2024). Movement analysis through videos in occupational therapy : insights from an ongoing research project for clinical practice. 6. Kongress Der Ergotherapie, Fribourg, Schweiz, 24.-25. Mai 2024.
• Wu, W., Heierli, J., Meisterhans, M., Moser, A., Färber, A., Dolata, M., Gavagnin, E., de Spindler, A., & Schwabe, G. (2024). PROMISE : model-driven stateful prompt orchestration for persuasive conversational interactions. 9th Swiss Text Analytics Conference – SwissText 2024, Chur, Switzerland, 10-11 June 2024.
• Städeli, R., Leu, R., Heierli, J., Meisterhans, M., Gavagnin, E., & de Spindler, A. (2024). Multimodal conversational interactions for facial composites : a case for stateful prompt orchestration [Conference paper]. In C. Capol, M. Cieliebak, A. Weichselbraun, C. Musat, E. Maier, & L. Zimmermann (Eds.), Proceedings of the 9th edition of the Swiss Text Analytics Conference (pp. 59–67). Association for Computational Linguistics. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-32139
• Wu, W., Heierli, J., Meisterhans, M., Moser, A., Färber, A., Dolata, M., Gavagnin, E., de Spindler, A., & Schwabe, G. (2024). PROMISE : a framework for model-driven stateful prompt orchestration [Conference paper]. In S. Islam & A. Sturm (Eds.), Intelligent Information Systems (pp. 157–165). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61000-4_18
• Helland, S., Gavagnin, E., & de Spindler, A. (2023). Divide et impera : multi-transformer architectures for complex NLP-tasks [Conference paper]. Proceedings of the 8th Edition of the Swiss Text Analytics Conference, 70–75. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-30386

Other publications

• Denzel, P., Weiss, M., Gavagnin, E., & Schilling, F.-P. (2026). Optimization of deep learning models for radio galaxy classification. arXiv. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2601.04773
• Brucker-Kley, E., Keller, T., Borghoff, B., Stutz, I., Michot, J., de Spindler, A., Gavagnin, E., & Turegard, J. (2024). Science fiction prototyping : friendship with artificial intelligence. ZHAW Zürcher Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-2495
• Brucker-Kley, E., Keller, T., Borghoff, B., Stutz, I., Michot, J., de Spindler, A., Gavagnin, E., & Turegard, J. (2024). Science Fiction Prototyping : Freundschaft mit Künstlicher Intelligenz. ZHAW Zürcher Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-2494
• Denzel, P., Schilling, F.-P., & Gavagnin, E. (2023, October 30). Map-to-map translation for SKA mock observations and cosmological simulations. Hammers & Nails 2023 - Swiss Edition, Ascona, Switzerland, 29 October - 3 November 2023. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-29047
• Denzel, P. B., Schilling, F.-P., & Gavagnin, E. (2023, January 11). Deep learning the SKA : the Square Kilometer Array project. Datalab Symposium, Winterthur, Schweiz, 11. Januar 2023. https://doi.org/10.21256/zhaw-27219

Oral conference contributions and abstracts

Sauerzopf, L., Chavez Panduro, C. G., Luft, A. R., Kühnis, B., Gavagnin, E., Unger, T., Easthope Awai, C., Schönhammer, J. G., Degenfellner, J., & Spiess, M. (2024, September 5). Transforming clinical assessments : rater reliability in video-based evaluation of upper extremity after stroke. Annual Conference of the Swiss Society for Biomedical Engineering (SSBE), Winterthur, Switzerland, 5 September 2024.

Publications before appointment at the ZHAW

• Elena Gavagnin, Andreas Bleuler, Joakim Rosdahl, Romain Teyssier, Star cluster formation in a turbulent molecular cloud self-regulated by photoionization feedback, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 472, Issue 4, December 2017, Pages 4155–4172,
• Elena Gavagnin, Michela Mapelli, George Lake, A critical look at the merger scenario to explain multiple populations and rotation in iron-complex globular clusters, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 461, Issue 2, 11 September 2016, Pages 1276–1287,
• M. Mapelli, A. Vallenari, R. D. Jeffries, E. Gavagnin, T. Cantat-Gaudin, G. G. Sacco, M. R. Meyer, E. J. Alfaro, M. Costado, F. Damiani, A. Frasca, A. C. Lanzafame, S. Randich, R. Sordo, S. Zaggia, G. Micela, E. Flaccomio, E. Pancino, M. Bergemann, A. Hourihane, C. Lardo, L. Magrini, L. Morbidelli, L. Prisinzano and C. C. Worley, "The Gaia-ESO Survey: N-body modelling of the Gamma Velorum cluster", A&A, 578 (2015) A35,

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