- Assistant Research Professor
I lead the Interfaces research programme at ML@CL on interpretable, self-sustaining multi-agent AI systems. The programme builds on the outputs of the AutoAI project and takes a systems perspective on the AI adoption problem: software systems are the interface between socio-technical needs and AI capabilities. It addresses the data dichotomy (data-driven systems must expose data that traditional architectures hide) and intellectual debt in deployed ML systems. Two complementary research lines: DOCS (data-oriented architectures) and S4 (self-sustaining systems with humans in control) support objectives to design, architect, and build AI-based systems and to interpret their autonomous behaviour. Work is validated across different domains, including critical ones like healthcare.
Previously, I was a Research Fellow at Trinity College Dublin, where I also received a Ph.D. in Computer Science (2020). My research at Trinity focused on context-aware, pervasive, and resilient systems architectures for large, distributed, and dynamic urban environments.
If you are interested in Part III or Masters project supervision at Cambridge, see the ML@CL available projects.
Research
Research Interests
- AI Systems
- Data-Oriented Architectures
- Multi-agent Systems
- Self-sustaining Systems
Publications
2026
- Paleyes, A., Sendyka, R., Robinson, D., Cabrera, C., Lawrence, N., Prompt Variability Effects on LLM Code Generation. Third International Workshop on Large Language Models for Code (LLM4Code 2026), co-located with ICSE 2026. (2026).
- Poon, J., Cabrera, C., Lawrence, N., iFogSim-Placement: A Simulation Framework for Edge Service Placement. 21st International Conference on Software Engineering for Adaptive and Self-Managing Systems (SEAMS 2026), co-located with ICSE 2026. (2026).
2025
- Cabrera, C., Paleyes, A., Thodoroff, P., Lawrence, N., Machine Learning Systems: A Survey from a Data-Oriented Perspective. ACM Computing Surveys. ACM (2025).
- Robinson, D., Cabrera, C., Gordon, A., Lawrence, N., Mennen, L., Requirements are All You Need: The Final Frontier for End-User Software Engineering. ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology. ACM (2025).
- Cabrera, C., Bastidas, V., Schooling, J., Lawrence, N., The Systems Engineering Approach in Times of Large Language Models. Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS). (2025).
- Sendyka, R., Cabrera, C., Paleyes, A., Robinson, D., Lawrence, N., LLM Performance for Code Generation on Noisy Tasks. Pre-print (arXiv). (2025).
2024
- Cabrera, C., Paleyes, A., Lawrence, N., Self-sustaining Software Systems (S4): Towards Improved Interpretability and Adaptation. International Workshop New Trends in Software Architecture (SATrends 24). ACM (2024).
- Kazmi, A., Staffolani, A., Zhang, T., Cabrera, C., Clarke, S., Dynamic Service Placement in Edge Computing: A Comparative Evaluation of Nature-Inspired Algorithms. IEEE Access. IEEE (2024).
2023
- Cabrera, C., Svorobej, S., Palade, A., Kazmi, A., Clarke, S., MAACO: A Dynamic Service Placement Model for Smart Cities. IEEE Transactions on Services Computing (TSC). IEEE (2023).
- Cardozo, N., Dusparic, I., Cabrera, C. Prevalence of Code Smells in Reinforcement Learning Projects. 2nd International Conference on AI Engineering (CAIN). (2023).
2022
- Cabrera, C., Clarke, S. A Self-Adaptive Service Discovery Model for Smart Cities. IEEE Transactions on Services Computing (TSC). IEEE (2022).
- Tabatabaee, H., Chaudhry, S., Kazmi, A., Palade, A., Cabrera, C., White, G., Clarke, S., Dynamic Service Placement in Multi-Access Edge Computing: A Systematic Literature Review. IEEE Access. IEEE (2022).
- Paleyes, A., Cabrera, C., Lawrence, N., An Empirical Evaluation of Flow Based Programming in the Machine Learning Deployment Context. 1st International Conference on AI Engineering (CAIN). (2022).
2021
- Cabrera, C., Clarke, S., A Reinforcement Learning-Based Service Model for the Internet of Things. 19th International Conference on Service Oriented Computing (ICSOC). ACM (2021).
- Paleyes, A., Cabrera, C., Lawrence, N., Towards better data discovery and collection with flow-based programming. Data-centric AI (DCAI) Workshop (2021).
2020
- Rojas, E., Bastidas, V., Cabrera, C., Cities-Board: A Framework to Automate the Development of Smart Cities Dashboards. IEEE Internet of Things Journal. IEEE (2020).
- White, G., Cabrera, C., Palade, A., Li, F., Clarke, S. WasteNet: Waste Classification at the Edge for Smart Bins. arXiv preprint arXiv:2006.05873. arXiv (2020).
- Palade, A., Mukhopadhyay, A., Kazmi, A., Cabrera, C., Nomayo, E., Iosifidis, G., Ruffini, M., Clarke, S. A Swarm-based Approach for Function Placement in Federated Edges International Conference on Services Computing. IEEE (2020).
- Cabrera, C., Palade, A., White, G., Clarke, S. An Urban-driven Service Request Management Model. International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom). IEEE (2020).
2019
- White, G., Palade, A., Cabrera, C., Clarke, S. Autoencoders for QoS Prediction at the Edge. International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom). IEEE (2019).
- Li, F., Cabrera, C., Clarke, S. A WS-Agreement Based SLA Ontology for IoT Services. International Conference on Internet of Things (ICIOT). Springer (2019).
2018
- Cabrera, C., Palade, A., White, G., Clarke, S. Services in IoT: A Service Planning Model based on Consumer Feedback. 16th International Conference on Service Oriented Computing (ICSOC). Springer (2018).
- Palade, A., Cabrera, C., White, G., Clarke, S. Stigmergic Service Composition and Adaptation in Mobile Environments. 16th International Conference on Service Oriented Computing (ICSOC). Springer (2018).
- Cabrera, C., White, G., Palade, A., Clarke, S. The right service at the right place: A service model for smart cities. International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom). IEEE (2018).
- White, G., Palade, A., Cabrera, C., Clarke, S. IoTPredict: Collaborative QoS Prediction in IoT. International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom). IEEE (2018).
- Palade, A., Cabrera, C., Li, F., White, G., Razzaque, M., Clarke, S. Middleware for internet of things: an evaluation in a small-scale IoT environment. Journal of Reliable Intelligent Environments. Springer (2018).
- White, G., Cabrera, C., Palade, A., Clarke, S. Augmented Reality in IoT. International Conference on Service-Oriented Computing Workshops (ICSOC). Springer (2018).
2017
- Cabrera, C., Palade, A., Clarke, S. An evaluation of service discovery protocols in the internet of things. 32nd Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC). ACM (2017).
- Cabrera, C., Li, F., Nallur, V., Palade, A., Razzaque, M., White, G., Clarke, S. Implementing heterogeneous, autonomous, and resilient services in iot: An experience report. 18th International Symposium on A World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks (WoWMoM). IEEE (2017).
- Palade, A., Cabrera, C., White, G., Razzaque, M., Clarke, S. Middleware for Internet of Things: A quantitative evaluation in small scale. 18th International Symposium on A World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks (WoWMoM). IEEE (2017).
- White, G., Palade, A., Cabrera, C., Clarke, S. Quantitative evaluation of qos prediction in iot. 47th International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks Workshops (DSN-W). IEEE (2017).
2014
- Cabrera, C., Mariño, O. Domain Specific Language for Handling Modular Ontologies. 9th Computing Colombian Conference (9CCC). IEEE (2014).
- Cabrera, C. Sedea: Prototipo de sistema experto para el diagnóstico de enfermedades autoinmunes de órgano basado en internist. Revista Universidad y Salud (2014).
Theses
- Ph.D.'s Thesis: uDiscovery: An Urban-Centric Model for Service Discovery in Smart Cities. School of Computer Science & Statistics. Discipline of Computer Science. Trinity College Dublin (2020).
- Master's Thesis: MOWL: Domain-Specific Language for Handling Modular Ontologies. Systems Engineering and Computing Department. Los Andes University, Bogotá (2014).
- Cabrera, C., Ruano, J. Dionisio: A Prototype Modeller for Simplex Linear Programming Problems. Undergraduate thesis, Universidad de Nariño (2011).
