Michele Ducceschi
Project’s P.I.
Michele holds a degree in Physics from the University of Padova, Italy (2008), an MSc in Acoustics and Music Technology from the University of Edinburgh (2010), and a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from ENSTA and Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, France (2014).
He is now a lecturer at the University of Bologna, Italy. Prior to that, he was a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow (2017) in the Acoustics and Audio Group, Reid School of Music, University of Edinburgh, and a Royal Society Newton Fellow (2015), always within Reid School of Music. He was also part of the NESS project.
His current research interests lie at the intersection of advanced physical modelling sound synthesis, physics, computer science and applied mathematics. He is also a co-founder of Physical Audio Instruments.
Matthew Hamilton
PhD Student (2022-2025), then Postdoctoral Researcher
Matthew is a twice graduate from the University of Edinburgh, First for a BMus. in Music Technology (2010) and second for a MSc. in Acoustics and Music Technology (2017). Matthew’s Master’s thesis was on the topic of coupling Finite Difference Time Domain string and plate models . In between his degrees, Matthew apprenticed as a luthier in London. He specialised in the repair and refurbishment of acoustic and electric guitars.
In 2018 Matthew undertook the role of Digital Development technician at the Edinburgh College of Art where he specialised in teaching artists how to incorporate computer programming and electronics within their work. In particular his role focused on fabricating custom interfaces for digital music creation and authoring audio software in C / C++.
Dr Craig Webb
Postdoctoral Researcher
Craig has a BSc in Computer Science from the University of Bath, and an MSc in Acoustics from the University of Edinburgh.This was followed by a PhD, as a member of the NESS research group at Edinburgh (NExt-generation Sound Synthesis).His thesis concerned the application of high performance computing architectures to large-scale acoustics simulations with embedded instruments.He then began exploring real-time systems running on consumer processors, producing audio plugins based on physical modelling algorithms.
Alexis Mousseau
Visiting PhD Student
Alexis has a Bachelor of Physics from the University of Poitiers (2019) and Master’s of Wave Physics and Acoustics from Le Mans University (2021) during which he studied nonlinear wave propagation in architected materials.
Since 2022, his PhD works focuses on the nonlinear dynamics of thin plates, mixing theoretical modeling, numerical finite differences approaches and experimental works, with a final objective of using nonlinear phenomenas in the context of sound absorption.
Alexis’s work is currently funded by the Institut d’Acoustique Graduate School (IAGS)
Dr Henna Tahvanainen
Postdoctoral Researcher
Sebastian Duran
PhD Student (2022-2025), then Postdoctoral Researcher
Sebastian is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Bologna. His research combines experimental modal analysis techniques, FEM-based modelling, and non-invasive reverse engineering practices to support restoration and design interventions on musical instruments.
He completed his B.Sc. in Music Technology in 2019 at Solent University, Southampton. In 2020, he obtained his M.Sc. in Applied Acoustics from the same University with a thesis focused on perceptual and objective data comparisons among geometrical acoustics-based software. In 2021, he completed a specialization course in Acoustics at the University of Bologna while he started a freelance collaboration as a graduate acoustician for a variety of projects, ranging from building to architectural and environmental acoustics. He earned a PhD in 2026 within the NEMUS ERC-funded project with a thesis focusing on an experimental characterization of musical instrument plates. During his PhD studies, he was a visiting researcher at the Institut technologique européen des métiers de la musique (ITEMM) and at FEMTO-ST Institute where he investigated the use of FEM-based analysis and Info-Gap theory as tools for risk assessment in musical instrument restoration and conservation. Since 2021, he has been a member of the EAA-Young Acousticians Network (YAN) and has experience as a sound engineer.
Riccardo Russo
PhD Student (2021-2024), then Postdoctoral Researcher
Riccardo is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Bologna, working at the intersection of physics, music, and computer science. His research focuses on developing efficient numerical methods to simulate the vibration of musical instruments, including real-time implementations.
He holds a B.Sc. in Physics from the University of Bologna and a first-level Master’s in Sound Engineering from the University of Rome Tor Vergata. He then joined IK Multimedia as a C++ developer, building audio plugins using the JUCE framework. He subsequently completed an M.Sc. in Sound and Music Computing at Aalborg University Copenhagen, with a thesis on the physical modelling and optimisation of an EMT 140 plate reverb — during which he undertook an internship at the GRAME-CNCM centre in Lyon, developing a library for Finite Difference physical modelling synthesis in the Faust programming language. He then earned a PhD in 2025 with a dissertation on non-iterative simulation techniques for nonlinear string vibration in musical acoustics. His doctoral work was carried out within the ERC-funded NEMUS project. During his PhD, he was a visiting researcher at the Acoustics and Audio Group of the University of Edinburgh, working on efficient Finite Difference Time Domain algorithms for real-time string simulation.
