On the trail of big data

This content was published on September 9, 2017 11:00 AMSep 9, 2017 - 11:00

A record number of visitors – 30,000 – tued out for the biannual science days hosted by the University of Zurich and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich.

Over the course of three days, some 300 researchers welcomed visitors at 60 stands, 40 lectures, and 14 workshops covering topics like health, robotics and climate science as well as the linguistic and cultural sciences. People could watch and participate in live experiments and ask questions of the scientists on hand.

The science cafés – where experts gave presentations and then discussed topics like artificial intelligence, financial investments, data joualism and gender in medicine – were filled to capacity. The weekend was also a chance to show how scientific findings can be transformed into hands-on business ideas.

“These spin-offs really show the immediate benefit that data science can have for all of us. Who wouldn’t want to play a musical instrument more precisely or have a custom-fit pair of jeans in their wardrobe? This is exactly what we’re doing at Scientificaexteal link: showing people the opportunities of digitalisation,” said ETH Zurich President Lino Guzzella in a post-event statement.

This was the fifth edition of Scientifica, as the event is called. The ETH Zurichexteal link and the University of Zurichexteal link will put on the next edition in 2019.

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