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Education

• PhD in Information and Communications Engineering, University of Klagenfurt (2022 - Now)
  • Under the supervision of Professor Andrea M. Tonello (University of Klagenfurt) and the co-supervision of Professor Deniz Gündüz (Imperial College of London)
  • Main research area: Responsible AI, with applications in communications engineering
• MSc in Control Systems Engineering, University of Padova (2020 - 2022)
  • Under the supervision of Professor Alessandro Chiuso (University of Padova)
  • Thesis topic: Deep learning to improve performance of bending machines at TRUMPF Italia
  • Final mark: 110/110 with honors
• BSc in Information Engineering, University of Padova (2017 - 2020)
  • Under the supervision of Professor Maria E. Valcher (University of Padova)
  • Thesis topic: Simulation of automatic control of rocket
  • Final mark: 110/110 with honors

Work experience

• Teaching Assistant, University of Klagenfurt (Mar. 2023 - Now)
  • Taught undergraduate and graduate corses: communication systems engineering (undergrad.) and machine learning for information and communication engineering (grad.)
• Project Assistant, University of Klagenfurt (collab. with Kelag International) (Apr. 2025 - Dec. 2025)
  • Project on “Power Line Communication for Metering - Data Analytics”
  • Contributed with a researcher role
• Visiting Researcher, Princeton University (June 2025 - July 2025)
  • Research collaboration with Professor H. Vincent Poor on neural channel capacity information (for non-communication people: it’s a scenario of mutual information maximization)
• Project Assistant, University of Klagenfurt (Sep. 2022 - Feb. 2024)
  • Project about creating a Network of competence on Internet of Things (NEON) with universities in Latin America
  • Contributed with an administrative role
• Researcher, University of Klagenfurt (Aug. 2022 - Feb. 2023)
  • Performed research on radio fingerprinting localization
  • Supervisor: Professor Andrea M. Tonello (University of Klagenfurt)
• Student intern, TRUMPF Italia (Mar. 2022 - June 2022)
  • Designed machine learning algorithms to improve the performance of bending machines
  • Supervisor: Professor Alessandro Chiuso (University of Padova)

Selected Publications

1. $f$-Divergence Based Classification: Beyond the Use of Cross-Entropy
   Nicola Novello, Andrea M. Tonello
   ICML – International Conference on Machine Learning, 2024
   [code]

2. Mutual Information Estimation via $f$-Divergence and Data Derangements
   Nunzio A. Letizia, Nicola Novello, Andrea M. Tonello
   NeurIPS – Annual Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems, 2024
   [code]

3. A Unified Framework for Diffusion Model Unlearning with f-Divergence
   Nicola Novello, Federico Fontana, Luigi Cinque, Deniz Gunduz, Andrea M. Tonello
   Preprint

4. Robust Classification with Noisy Labels Based on Posterior Maximization
   Nicola Novello, Andrea M. Tonello
   Preprint

5. Copula Density Neural Estimation
   Nunzio A. Letizia, Nicola Novello, Andrea M. Tonello
   IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems, 2025
   [code]