2019 News
Amsterdam knowledge institutes to invest 1 billion euros in AI
CWI and other Amsterdam-based knowledge institutes have joined forces to invest 1 billion euros in the development of responsible AI technologies. The partners will set up research programmes, attract top scientists and educate students with state-of-the-art knowledge of AI.
CWI wishes you a merry Christmas and a happy 2020!
CWI is closed from Wednesday 25 December through Wednesday 1 January 2020. We wish you a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year!
Better parallel programming with help of ABS language
Current programming languages cannot use the full potential power of manycore chips. Keyvan Azadbakht studied the formal programming language ABS and extended the programming model and analysis techniques. He defended his PhD thesis on 11 December.
Tim Baarslag joins The Young Academy
CWI researcher Tim Baarslag has been appointed as a new member of The Young Academy. Starting in 2020, he will join this platform for young scientists who are recognised internationally for their talent. The Young Academy is an independently operating platform within the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW).
Alina Striner (DIS) awarded Best Paper Award at ICIDS 2019
On 22 November, Alina Striner of CWI’s Distributed and Interactive Systems (DIS) group was awarded the Best Paper Award at ICIDS 2019, the International Conference on Interactive Digital Storytelling.
CWI develops new mathematical tools for analysis of rare events
PhD student Bohan Chen of CWI’s Stochastics group, developed new mathematical tools for rare event analysis. Chen’s PhD research has mainly focused on large deviations theory and rare-event simulation in heavy-tailed settings.
Privacy-friendly and data-driven HIV treatments
Thomas Attema (TNO en CWI) will present a lecture on privacy-friendly and data-driven HIV treatments, at the dcypher Symposium 2019. during the Secure Multi-Party Computation and Data Sharing session.
Peter Bosman awarded NWO KLEIN grant
Peter Bosman of CWI's Life Sciences & Health group has been awarded a NWO KLEIN grant together with Amsterdam UMC.
Smart mobility start-up Skialabs launched by CWI researchers
Traffic flows in cities could be managed much more efficiently thanks to cutting-edge technology pioneered by the new start-up Skialabs. By using huge dataflows collected in cities, the Skialabs platform provides a real-time view on the mobility flows in the city. This allows creating cost-effective and sustainable mobility services that react instantly to the demands of the end-users.
Ivan Herman contributes to Contract for the Web
Sir Tim Berners-Lee and the Web Foundation have published the 'Contract for the Web', which was prepared by a large group of international experts, including Ivan Herman (CWI and W3C). CWI also signed it.
CWI eert David Chaum en Guido van Rossum met ‘Dijkstra Fellowship’
Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) zal dit jaar voor het eerst in haar geschiedenis de “Dijkstra Fellowship” uitreiken. De eretitel wordt deze editie toegekend aan David Chaum en Guido van Rossum.
David Chaum and Guido van Rossum awarded Dijkstra Fellowship
Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) will grant the honorary title ‘Dijkstra Fellow’ for the first time in its history. This edition the Dijkstra Fellowship will be awarded to David Chaum and Guido van Rossum.
CWI and INRIA use AI to better predict harmful solar storms
Extreme solar storms can have destructive effects on communications and electrical power grids. To improve space weather forecasting systems Mandar Chandorkar combined AI and data from space missions. He defends his thesis on 14 November.
Extreme events better investigated with new math method
Fortunately, incidents like extreme weather, earthquakes or massive power grid blackouts are a rare occurrence. Analysing properly how likely such rare incidents are to happen can be very valuable, but also very challenging. In his PhD thesis, Krzysztof Bisewski developed mathematical methods that greatly speed up simulations for estimating the probability of rare events.
CWI research collaboration leads to 100 million euro investment in Amsterdam
CWI’s research partner Databricks announced it will invest 100 million euros to expand its Amsterdam office. The company aims to grow to hundreds of R&D engineers. Databricks settled in Amsterdam nearly three years ago because of its research collaboration with CWI.
New data framework illuminates uncertainties in offshore wind farm conditions
Wind speeds and wave heights can have a major effect on offshore wind farms. But because they are correlated, their combined significance for wind farm designs couldn’t be factored in until now. CWI researcher Anne Eggels developed methods which take the effect of such correlations or dependencies into account. Today, she will publicly defend her thesis at the University of Amsterdam.
Life Sciences and Health group awarded RISE grant
The Life Sciences and Health group have been awarded a Research and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE) grant from the European Commission.
QuSoft/CWI team earns 4th place in Benelux Algorithm Programming Contest 2019
On Saturday 19 October 2019, Arjan Cornelissen, Farrokh Labib and Ruben Brokkelkamp formed a combined QuSoft/CWI team in the BAPC 2019 programming contest. They earned the 4th place, competing against companies such as ASML, Booking.com, Ortec and Sioux.
NWO KLEIN grant for Stacey Jeffery and Marie Colette van Lieshout
CWI researchers Stacey Jeffery and Marie Colette van Lieshout have been awarded a grant from the NWO KLEIN programme.
Farewell Symposium ‘Declarative Amsterdam’ for Steven Pemberton
CWI celebrates the career of Web pioneer and CWI researcher Steven Pemberton on 4 October with the symposium ‘Declarative Amsterdam’. He is well-known for his pioneering work on (X)HTML, CSS and XForms – a Web language that can possibly speed up programming time 10 times.
CWI signs partnership for Meaningful Control of Autonomous Systems
Together with TNO and the University of Amsterdam, CWI initiates a new research collaboration to study the impact of autonomous systems in society and the adoption of AI-based systems. Today, the three members are signing a letter of intent, called Meaningful Control of Autonomous Systems (MCAS).
MonetDB Solutions secures investment from ServiceNow
MonetDB Solutions, a company formed by researchers at CWI, announces an investment from digital workflow company ServiceNow to help large enterprises drive digital transformation.
Most Influential Paper award for SWAT researchers at SCAM ‘19
CWI’s SWAT group has been awarded the prize for most influential paper for the article that introduced programming language Rascal ten years ago at the SCAM conference.
CWI research connects quantum computing and optimization
Sander Gribling studied if and how quantum computers can help solve optimization problems, like finding the shortest route. He developed new quantum algorithms that can help to solve them more efficiently. He defends his PhD thesis on 30 September.
ERCIM Cor Baayen Young Researcher Award 2019 for András Gilyén and Ninon Burgos
András Gilyén has been selected as winner of the 2019 ERCIM Cor Baayen Young Researcher Award, together with CNRS researcher Ninon Burgos. The award committee lauds their outstanding scientific research quality and its impact on science. Gilyén performed his award winning PhD research at CWI.
CWI ontwikkelt unieke methode voor genoom-reconstructie gemuteerde virussen
Jasmijn Baaijens, promovenda bij de Life Sciences & Health groep van Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) heeft een unieke rekenmethode ontwikkeld die het mogelijk maakt gemuteerde virussen te reconstrueren.
CWI develops unique method for genome-reconstruction of mutated viruses
Jasmijn Baaijens, PhD student in CWI’s Life Sciences and Health group, has developed a new computational tool that can reconstruct genomes of mutated versions of viruses like HIV, Zika and Ebola
Mathematical tools reconstruct ancient genetic code
The genetic code of the last universal common ancestor of all present life on earth, appears to be surprisingly advanced. In his PhD thesis, Peter van der Gulik provides mathematical tools to reconstruct this genetic code. He also proposes a new parameter to characterize the genetic code that provides information about the production of amino acids.
National Agenda on Quantum Technology released
The Dutch National Agenda on Quantum Technology is presented to State Secretary Mona Keijzer this afternoon by physicist Robbert Dijkgraaf. The Agenda provides propositions to further develop the Netherlands as an international centre for quantum technology.
Scientists develop detailed representation of clouds in weather and climate models
A team of climate researchers and computational experts has developed an innovative method to study cloud dynamics in unprecedented detail in weather and climate models.