Prof. Alba leads the NEO group at the University of Málaga, Spain. His ongoing research includes the fields of ad hoc metropolitan network optimization, optimal design of GSM networks, logistics, vehicle routing, natural language tagging, software engineering, DNA fragment assembly, gene microarrays, cutting/packing, software testing and validation, and in general combinatorial problems lying in the base of real-world problems. New fields like multiobjective techniques with high scalability, grid/P2P/Internet platforms, dynamic optimization of problems whose definition change in time, and heterogeneous algorithms are dealt with as part both of basic and applied research. Recently, he has been involved in several projects and Ph.D. theses dealing with the construction and utilization of vehicular ad hoc networks. As for techniques, Alba and his group are dealing mainly with metaheuristics, either bio-inspired or not, and also hybridization with other methods. Specifically, genetic algorithms, particle swarm, ant colonies, simulated annealing, branch and bound, differential evolution, variable neighbourhood search, and related solvers are used. Prof. Alba has published seven books on metaheuristics and bio-inspired techniques, more than 50 papers indexed in ISI impact journals, and more than 200 conference papers. He has coordinated several Spanish national research projects like TRACER, OPLINK, M*, DIRICOM, and the new roadME initiative. His work has achieved internationalization via his participation in bilateral projects with INRIA like PERFOM, MOID, Robust&Green, and European CELTIC projects like or FP7 COADVISE. He holds active collaborations by joining publications and exchanges with more than 20 international universities and labs, and his research in Málaga is also provoking industrial transferences to several companies including TARTEC S.A., OPTIMI, Arelance, NOVASOFT, ETRA I+D, Moviquity, VTT, and Synergiums. Alba works in the program committee of leading conferences in several fields, including ACM GECCO, IEEE CEC, PPSN, Evo*, IPDPS, as well as organizing international events frequently. He also works as a reviewer for the IEEE Transactions Journals on Evolutionary Computation, Education, and Parallel and Distributed Systems. Besides, he is an active reviewer for SMC, JPDC, PARCO, Journal of Heuristics, JMMA, EJOR, Computer Communications, MIT Evolutionary Computation, Software Practice and Experience, and Information Sciences. According to Google Scholar, as of 2018 he has an h-index of 55 and around 15,000 citations to his work.
