D-INFK news channel

Monitoring and treating a case of multiple sclerosis requires reliable and long-​term data on how the disease is progressing in the person in question. Fitness trackers and smartphones can supply this data, as a research team led by ETH Zurich has now shown.

Public cloud services employ special security technologies. Professor Shweta Shinde has, together with her Secure & Trustworthy Systems Group, discovered a gap in the latest security mechanisms used by AMD and Intel chips. This affects major cloud providers.  

Raphael Steiner received his doctorate in mathematics at the age of 21. Now the Swiss National Science Foundation is funding his research at the ETH Institute of Theoretical Computer Science in the field of graph theory. Among other things, this involves proving a conjecture that is over 80 years old.

Are we witnessing the rise of a different, adaptive artificial intelligence (AI) that works with humans and supports them with smart decisions? Computer scientist Niao He is investigating how this kind of AI can be theoretically underpinned so that it really does provide benefits.

Johanna Pirker, Assistant Professor at Graz University of Technology, spent September and October as a visiting professor at the Game Technology Center (GTC) of ETH Zurich. In this interview, she explains what we can learn from video games and why our image of gamers does not correspond to reality.

Autonomous virtual humans that move and behave naturally are Siyu Tang’s vision. One area from which the computer scientist draws inspiration are our behavioural patterns. Collaboration with architects and surgeons provides further input – and it also reveals the enormous potential of virtual people.

Data contains much more than just the information on the surface. With statistics, deeper cause-​and-effect relationships can be brought to light. This is what Alexander Marx is researching as a Fellow at the ETH AI Center using artificial intelligence. One of his goals is to be able to make predictions regarding diabetes in children.

In this video, postdoc Ece Özkan Elsen talks about her return to research, why she loves medical data science, and how she works to support other women in computer science.

Carl August Zehnder's work not only shaped the Department of Computer Science, but also the Swiss state and society. In this continuing conversation, the founder of D-INFK explains the benefits of associations, how not to lose touch in a fast-moving field and why openness is of great importance for computer scientists.

Professor emeritus Carl August Zehnder is one of the founders of the Department of Computer Science. In this video, he talks about how his research field developed out of practical necessity, the competitive pressure against other departments, and the importance of infrastructure at ETH Zurich.

Professor emeritus Walter Gander was a strong advocate for computer science since the 80s. He was committed to independent computer science teaching in Swiss schools, supported women in CS and participated in development projects abroad. In the second part of this interview, Walter Gander tells us about his work as head of department, his long-term book projects and how copy & paste was done in the 80s.

Prof. em. Walter Gander helped Switzerland acquire a high-performance computer, promoted the implementation of e-mail at ETH Zurich, and wrote the first book using LaTeX. In this interview with Lukas Fässler, high above the rooftops of Zurich, he talks about the beginnings of the Department of Computer Science and about a career that stretched from St. Gallen to Hong Kong.

From robots that offer solace to algorithms that help judges make fact-​based decisions, robotics and machine learning are entering new domains that were once the preserve of humans.

How does the Internet of Things change our lives? What does computer science mean for society? Before his retirement in 2020, Professor Friedemann Mattern studied small things in a big context.

In this interview with the European Research Council, Professor Martin Vechev of the Secure, Reliable, and Intelligent Systems Lab talks about his ERC-funded work, AI breakthroughs, and Europe’s future in the field of AI.

Kristina Hostáková joined Professor Dennis Hofheinz’s research group at the Institute of Theoretical Computer Science last December as a postdoc. In this interview, she talks about asymmetric cryptography, her experiences on the path to ETH Zurich and the promotion of women in computer science.

In light of International Women's Day 2020, ETH Zurich puts successful women centre stage. Read about Prof. Julia Vogt, tenure track assistant professor of medical data science, in this article.

Initially, he wanted to be a particle physicist. Today, he helps protect the rainforest using artificial intelligence and blockchain. David Dao, a doctoral student at the DS3Lab at the Department of Computer Science, travelled to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Madrid in December to present his research. In an interview, he explains how artificial intelligence can help the climate, but how it also poses risks.

Bernhard Schölkopf, Director of the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and Affiliated Professor at ETH Zurich, today received the Körber European Science Prize for his research in the field of machine learning and artificial intelligence.

Vasiliki Kalavri didn’t know anything about computer science before she encountered it at university. Today, she is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Computer Science at ETH Zurich. Dr. Kalavri and her team are building Strymon, a next-generation stream processing system that is faster, more flexible and more autonomous than existing systems.

Fuelled by a recent surge in artificial intelligence technologies, robotics is on the verge of taking centre stage in our society. Nevertheless, before robots can assist us with everyday chores at work and at home, they will need the skills to perform an increasingly diverse array of tasks. Professor Stelian Coros, leader of the Computational Robotics Lab within the Department of Computer Science, is developing the mathematical foundations for new algorithms that address this fundamental challenge.

Dana Drachsler Cohen is an outstanding IT specialist at ETH Zurich. The Israeli researcher is working on the security of systems such as autonomous vehicles and cryptocurrencies.

ETH computer scientist Bernd Gärtner explains why even youngsters should get to grips with computer science.

Digitalisation simplifies many aspects of our everyday life, but it also creates new risks. Srdjan Capkun, Professor for Information Security, explains how to find the right balance between convenience and security.

At the age of 29, Professor of Computer Science Mohsen Ghaffari is one of the youngest professors at ETH Zurich. But in his native Iran he originally studied quite a different subject.

Professor Olga Sorkine has won this year’s Rössler Prize for her work in the field of computer graphics. The prize comes with a research award of CHF 200,000.

D-INFK Professor Martin Vechev is automating the computer programming process: he is one of the first researchers ever to teach computers how to write their own software. This makes him one of the founders of a new field of research that is growing rapidly.

Computer scientist Torsten Hoefler is the winner of this year’s Latsis Prize awarded by ETH Zurich. His Scalable Parallel Computing Laboratory is one of the few laboratories to combine theory and application in the field of high-​performance computing. Although mentors warned him against uniting these two aspects, it is precisely by doing so that he has now achieved his success.

Postdoctoral researcher Alex Summers of Prof. Peter Müller's Chair of Programming Methodology has received the junior AITO Dahl-​Nygaard Prize for his work on the verification of object-​oriented programs and type systems. In the interview, he talks about computer science and his passion for it.

Computers and communication networks need a lot of electricity; they are responsible for 1-2 percent of the worldwide energy usage. On the other hand, they can help save energy in other places. In this area, "smart" information technology is becoming increasingly important. (German)

Computer are many times more powerful today than when they first appeared. But did they also become more efficient? A not insignificant portion of our energy expenditure is owed to our digital networking. (German)

At first glance, the internet seems to work reliably. A closer inspection, however, reveals some serious flaws, including large-​scale breakdowns and unwelcome data redirections. Computer science professor Adrian Perrig now proposes a new internal architecture to remedy these discrepancies.

The last 40 years have seen an explosion of innovation and economic growth within the biotechnology industry. For nearly the same amount of time, Prof. Gaston Gonnet has researched at the intersection between technology and life itself: in bioinformatics and computational biology.. In the light of his retirement, these lines pay homage to Prof. Gonnet’s academic achievements spent in the service of humanity.

In 2013, Timothy Roscoe was elected to the grade of ACM Fellow for his contributions to operating systems and networking research in computing and information technology. In the interview, he talks about his current research and about measuring success.

Niklaus Wirth became internationally renowned for developing the Pascal programming language, allowing a generation of computer scientists to learn to program. This pioneering figure celebrates his 80th birthday – which doesn’t mean he isn’t still busy developing the simplest and most elegant programs possible.

Prof. Niklaus Wirth, one of the great pioneers of computer technology, has been praised as a designer of programming languages, compilers, operating systems and even hardware, and his research is strongly guided by the constant search for simplicity, clarity and efficiency. The following interview sought not only to highlight Niklaus Wirth’s contemporary views on the latest technological developments, but also to capture, to some degree, the personality of the computer scientist through and through.

Big data is hot news. The opportunities for analysing huge amounts of unstructured data are highly valued in industry and science, yet there is also concern about data protection. ETH information technology professor Donald Kossmann researches and teaches in the field of big data and is convinced that the benefits will outweigh the risks.

In this interview, Professor Donald Kossmann talks about how his research tackles global challenges and what the title of ACM Fellow means to him.

Today, computers are no longer calculators or data processors, but windows to the internet. Soon, they will go through another transformation. (German)

Every year, the Fritz Kutter fund awards outstanding industry-​related theses in computer science. In 2010, René Müller, a former doctoral student with Prof. Alonso, received this sought-​after prize. Currently based at the IBM Research Center in Almaden, René came over to Zurich on November 22 to take home his "trophy" – a good opportunity to talk to him about his passion for research, visions and how he would make Zurich a better place for IT.

Prof. Gustavo Alonso has recently received the VLDB 10 Year Best Paper Award. This award has been established for the author(s) whose paper appeared in the VLDB conference 10 years ago and has had the most impact on database research since then. In the interview, Prof. Alonso talks on the significance of this award and the impact of his remarkable research achievements on society, as well as business and industry.

Two female doctoral students at the Department of Computer Science have received the 2010 Google Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship Award, and two more were among the finalists.