Mariana Pinheiro Bento

Assistant Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Schulich School of Engineering, University of Calgary, with a joint appointment in the Department of Electrical and Software Engineering. Full Member of the Hotchkiss Brain Institute and Child Health & Wellness Researcher at the Alberta Children's Hospital Research Institute.

Educational Background:

• PhD in Computer Engineering, University of Campinas (UNICAMP), 2016
• MSc in Computer Engineering, University of Campinas (UNICAMP), 2012
• BSc in Teleinformatics Engineering, Federal University of Ceara (UFC), 2010

Dr. Bento's research centers on Artificial Intelligence for Healthcare applications, emphasizing responsibility, trustworthiness, fairness, and bias mitigation. Her work addresses demographic biases and heterogeneous data variability in acquisition protocols across scanners and sites. She develops methods for multi-modal data integration to improve model reliability, generalization, and real-world translation. Key research areas include:

• Artificial Intelligence
• Biomedical Engineering
• Computer Vision
• Brain Magnetic Resonance Imaging
• Fairness and Privacy in Machine Learning
• Responsible AI
• Trustworthy ML
• AI for social good

Her publications (2018-2024) demonstrate consistent focus on neuroimaging and pediatric applications, with strong emphasis on multi-modal data integration, bias mitigation in heterogeneous datasets, and explainable AI for medical diagnosis. Recurring themes include Alzheimer's disease detection, prenatal alcohol exposure analysis, and robust MRI processing techniques.

Dr. Bento participates in university strategic initiatives including Child Health and Wellness (2020-2025) and Engineering Solutions for Health (2015-2021). She completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Radiology and Clinical Neuroscience at the University of Calgary before joining as tenure-track faculty in 2021.