Our Core Team

 

Isabella Dobrescu, PhD

Chief Science / Head, Founder

Isabella is a Professor at the UNSW School of Business. She is an experienced researcher and has received many awards for teaching excellence. She is renowned for her ageing and maths research, which covers computational economics, statistical analysis, and experimental design. She has over 9 years of experience in gameplay and the use of gamification as a platform for teaching.

For more details, see Isabella’s website.

 

Alberto Motta, PhD

Chief Science / Creative Director, Founder

Alberto is Associate Professor at the UNSW School of Business. He has taught Micro 1 to 9,000+ students and won many awards, including UNSW’s highest teaching excellence award (Heinz Harant). He was also the 1st recipient of ASB students choice award, and went on winning it again in 2015. He is an expert in economic theory, experimental design, and programming. Playconomics is the result of 9+ years of research on using gamification to boost student engagement.

For more details, see Alberto’s website.

Aleksa Bozic

Senior Software Developer

Aleksa graduated from University of Technology Sydney with a BSc in Games Development. He is a highly passionate programmer, expert at identify and fixing problems. As his Unity and C# XNA games show, he is someone always pushing for advanced technology and functionality even when required to go above and beyond to develop such features.

Richard Antecki

Senior (Back-End) Software Engineer

Richard is an enthusiastic software developer with a background in Computer Science and Finance and over 14 years experience across a range of technologies, platforms, roles and industries. He has a passion for finding elegant solutions to problems and loves learning new things and getting thrown in the deep end (which LionsHeart provides in spades).

For more details, see Richard’s website.

Timothy Johnson, PhD

Senior Software Developer

Timothy is a prodigious games developer who graduated from La Trobe University with his PhD in Computer Science in 2014. His thesis, titled “Agent Simulations on Graphics Hardware”, explores the possibility of using a GPU for large-scale agent-based simulations. He now applies his knowledge of agent systems, as well as his previous experience in creating educational games, to the development of Playconomics and all related projects.

For more details, see Timothy’s website.

 

Ben Martin-Wheatley

Software Developer

Ben is a keen mathematician, programmer and game designer. He loves solving hard problems and strives to make a satisfying product. The three best video game soundtracks belong to Katamari Damacy, Risk of Rain and Persona 3 and no one can convince him otherwise.

Yeung Cheng

Artist, Designer

Yeung is a Bachelor of Media Arts Honours graduate from UNSW Art & Design. She specialises in concept designs, 2D/ 3D animation, and contributes to all elements of visual design for LionsHeart projects. She has been known to transform projects into something special – unique with its own stories to tell.