Apostolos Apostolaras received the Diploma, the M.Sc and the Ph.D degree in electrical engineering from the University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece, in 2007, 2009, and 2014 respectively. He is currently a Senior Researcher affiliated with the Network Implementation Testbed Laboratory (NITLab), Volos, Greece. He works also as a project manager and technical coordinator for EU funded research projects leading a group of researchers and students dealing with aspects related to the design of novel architectures in the emerging field of communications and data networks. His area of expertise is experimentally driven research in utilizing testbed platforms for verification and performance evaluation of next generation communication systems and his current research efforts focus on the digital transformation of vertical sectors utilizing novel digital technologies, such as AI, IoT, Blockchain, 5G & beyond communication technologies and Data Spaces.