Marco Ruffini received the M.Eng. degree in telecommunications from the Polytechnic University of Marche, Italy, in 2002, and the Ph.D. degree Trinity College Dublin (TCD) in 2007, where he joined Trinity College Dublin in 2005, after working as a Research Scientist with Philips, Germany. He is Associate Professor and Fellow of Trinity College and he is Principal Investigator of both the CONNECT Telecommunications Research Centre, and the IPIC Photonics Integration Centre. He is currently involved in several Science Foundation Ireland and H2020 projects, and leads the Optical Network Architecture Group, TCD. He has authored over 140 international publications, over ten patents and contributed to standards at the broadband forum. His main research is in the area of 5G optical networks, where he carries out pioneering work on the convergence of fixed-mobile and access-metro networks, and on the virtualization of next generation networks, and has been invited to share his vision through several keynote and talks at major international conferences across the world.