CRC 1461

International Workshop "Bio-inspired Information Pathways" by CRC 1461 and CogniCron, Groningen

What happens when 72 scientists go on a ship...

The first International Workshop "Bio-inspired Information Pathways" by the CRC 1461 in collaboration with partners from CogniCron, University of Groningen, the Netherlands started on Sep. 5 with an icebreaker event at Kiel University. The event included the remote kick-off talk "Fungal Neuroscience" by Andrew Adamatzki (UWE Bristol), a poster session by doctoral researchers from both the CRC and from Groningen and an exhibition by the SOP of the CRC 1461. A total of 85 participants met and mingled at the event, enganged in discussions at more than 30 presented posters and was pleasantly surprised by a food truck.  The SOP-exhibition comprised science outreach materials, such as augmented reality posters and VR-applications, on several research topics of the CRC as well as an insight in the student laboratory program klick!:labor.

For 72 scientists the event continued the next day with a mini-conference-cruise on the Color Fantasy on its way from Kiel to Oslo and back to Kiel. The conference program was of excellent scientific quality thanks to the seven renowned invited speakers who joined from seven different countries and four different continents. The conference took off with a warm welcome by spokesperson Hermann Kohlstedt, followed by the talks "Material Learning in Dopant Network Processing Units" (Wilfred G. van der Wiel, University of Twente, The Netherlands / University of Münster, Münster, Germany), "Neuromorphic Dynamics and Information Processing in Nanowire Networks" (Zdenka Kuncic, University of Sydney, Australia) and "Organic Neuromorphic Electronics for Learning and Bio-interfacing" (Paschalis Gkoupidenis, MPI Mainz, Germany). The next morning Matthew Cook (ETH Zürich, Switzerland) kindly filled in for a cancelled talk before the arrival in Oslo, Norway. During the afternoon the participants then enjoyed the talks "Life at the Edge: Complexity and Criticality in Biological Function" (Dante R. Chialvo, Universidad Nacional de San Martin, Argentina), "Nanoscale Ion Transport: A Bio-inspired Machinery " (Paul Robin, Sorbonne Université, Université Paris-Cité, France) and "Criticality in Self-Organised Nanoscale Networks" (Simon Brown, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand).

The program was designed to leave room for the participants to get to know each other and exchange ideas. The ferry offered a unique setting for everyone to deeply engage in scientific discussions without the distractions of everyday life. After the arrival back in Kiel on Sep. 8, 2022 the feedback was overwhelmingly positive and we are looking back to very productive days resulting in fruitful international collaborations.

If you would like to read more about the presented research please click here for the abstract booklet.