Mehdi Hellou is a Research Fellow at the University of Manchester's Cognitive Robotics Lab (COROLAB), working within the EU's Horizon Europe programme PRIMI. Mehdi was previously an Early-Stage Researcher and PhD student at the University of Manchester (UoM), working on the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Innovative Training Networks project PERSEO, under the supervision of Prof. Angelo Cangelosi and Dr. Samuele Vinanzi.

His research focuses on improving social robot behaviours in real-world, human-centred environments by applying the premises of Theory of Mind (ToM) to enable personalised interactions. This includes designing and testing computational architectures for ToM that considers each user's individual differences and needs, tailoring the robot's actions through Reinforcement Learning techniques such as Inverse Reinforcement Learning.

Prior to his postgraduate studies at UoM, Mehdi completed a Master of Engineering in Robotics from Polytech Sorbonne University, followed by a Master's in Computer Science at Sorbonne University Pierre and Marie Curie. He also completed several internships at robotic companies, Aldebaran Robotics in Paris and robotTUNER in Wageningen.