Past workshops

Workshop organisers: Ruth Misener, Jan Kronqvist, David Ham, Pietro Belotti, Miguel Anjos
Organising departments: Computing, Mathematics

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Workshop organisers: Franco Sassi, Mauricio Barahona
Organising departments: Business School, Mathematics
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With the support of the Quantitative Sciences Research Institute, Prof. Franco Sassi, Director of the Centre for Health Economics & Policy Innovation (CHEPI) at Imperial College Business School, and Prof. Mauricio Barahona, Director of the Centre for Mathematics of Precision Healthcare, hosted a workshop on the 24th February 2020 in London bringing together mathematical modellers from a wide range of disciplines and policy makers to discuss the latest advances and trends in modelling, how different disciplines approach common problems, and to learn from each other on how to successfully influence policy decisions using models.

Mathematics of Planet Earth exhibition is an international exhibition displaying exhibits, videos and computer programs illustrating how mathematics plays a role in answering essential questions that concern our planet. Through a series of graphics, visualisations and hands-on experiments attendees discovered contributions that mathematics makes to topics such as astronomy, fluid dynamics, seismology, glaciology and cartography. The exhibition took place from 15–23 February 2020. The MPE CDT partners' reception on 18 February 2020 was partially funded by the QSRI. See news about the event here.

Workshop organisers: Sarah Filippi, Seth Flaxman, Molly Stevens, Chloe Stockford
Organising departments: Mathematics, Materials, DSI, School of Public Health
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This workshop on experimental design was very successful. Among the 35 participants, 22 were from Imperial while other participants came from UCL, the University of Southampton, ETH Zurich and the University of Nottingham. The workshop was highly inter-disciplinary with participants from various disciplines including materials, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, manufacturing, optoelectronics, medicine as well as computer science, statistics and mathematics. The programme included a tutorial on traditional methods for experimental design followed by six talks on more recent experimental design approaches and their application in various area including bioengineering, quantum thermodynamics, and pharmacology. Five out of the seven invited speakers were women. The second part of the afternoon was dedicated to the discussion in small groups of three experimental problems in materials: the participants were divided in small groups and spent twice 45 minutes identifying possible solutions to these specific problems. 

Workshop organisers: Anna Freni-Sterrantino, Seth Flaxman, Jeff Eaton
Organising departments: Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Mathematics, Data Science Institute (DSI), School of Public Health
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We organized the workshop in two parts: a Stan course training lead by Dr Lambert and  a second part with invited speakers: Dr Betancourt (Symplectomorphic, LLC), Dr Smith (University of Bath), Dr Kantas (Dep. of Mathematics, ICL), Dr Bhatt ( Epidemiology and Biostatistics,  ICL), Dr Briol (Alan Turing/UCL). We had a total of 41 attendees over the training and the talks, including: 2 London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine; 1 Warwick University, Statistics Department; 1 freelancer in data science; 3 King’s College London; 1 Eigentech; 26 School of Public Health; 4 Department of Mathematics ; 1 Department of Medicine; 1 National Heart & Lung Institute; 1 Centre for Environmental Policy.

A. Freni-Sterrantino, main organiser commented: "From our feedback survey (50% of participants), we had very positive comments: 'Well organised and speakers were very good'; 'Great selection of topics; workshop is informative'; 'Quality talks, and a nice balance between lectures and exercises'; 'Please organise more workshops.'; and general appreciation for the speakers. We think that this kind of workshop, with such mix of participants, may be run yearly, as the feedback was positive and encouraging.  We also had many requests to attend that we had to decline. We believe that there is a keen interest. Workshop that targets different aspects of Bayesian statistics could also be run to specific audiences. After this experience, we are excited to continue in this direction."

Workshop organisers: Ed Cohen, Niall Adams, Paul Freemont
Organising departments: Mathematics, Medicine
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Biomaging (imaging as applied to cellular biology) is a vital tool used across the life sciences for observing cellular structures and processes. It plays a major role in the understanding of diseases and infections and in the development of new drugs and treatments; from cancer to Alzheimer’s to HIV. Quantitative bioimaging is concerned with the quantitative analysis of bioimages. While physicists, biophysicists and engineers are driving forward revolutionary advances in imaging and experimental techniques, allowing cellular processes and structures to be observed in unprecedented detail. We are at a point where the bioimaging community is producing a vast quantity of impressive images but are still lacking, or are not aware of, the quantitative tools needed to fully understand and analyse their data. This workshop brought together researchers from across a large range of scientific disciplines, reflecting the truly interdisciplinary nature of modern bioimaging. It nurtured dialogue and a cross-fertilization of ideas between the different communities, leading to collaborations that will drive forward our understanding of how the human body interacts with cancers and pathogens for the development of powerful new therapeutics.

Speakers attended from the following departments and universities: Department of Biomedical Engineering, Texas A&M; Department of Medicine, University of Southampton; Department of Physics, Kings College London; Department of Mathematics, Imperial College London; Laboratory of Experimental Biophysics, EPFL; Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge; Department of Mathematics, Kings College London; Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London; Department of Computer Science, University of Birmingham; Randall Centre for Cell & Molecular Biophysics, Kings College London; Bioimage Analysis Unit, Institut Pasteur; Interdisciplinary Institute for Neuroscience, University of Bordeaux; Department of Computational Biology, Institut Pasteur; Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Cambridge; Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford; DeepMind, Google; Department of Medicine, University of Oxford; MRC Lab for Molecular Cell Biology, UCL; Department of Physics, Imperial College London.

Workshop organisers: Vahid Shahrezaei, Samuel Marguerat, Mauricio Barahona
Organising departments/bodies: Mathematics, Medicine, Sanger Institute
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The workshop secured a full set of 15 internationally renowned invited speakers spanning a range of topic areas: Omer Bayraktar (Sanger Institute, UK); Long Cai (Caltech, USA); Manfred Claassen (ETH Zürich, Switzerland); Lieven Clement (Ghent University, Belgium); Martin Hemberg (Sanger Institute, UK); Christina Kendziorski (University of Wisconsin, USA); Jessica Li (University of California, Los Angeles, USA); Sten Linnarsson (Karolinska Institutet, Sweden); Jonas Maaskola (KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden); Lucas Pelkmans (University of Zürich, Switzerland); Magnus Rattray (University of Manchester, UK); Mark Robinson (University of Zürich, Switzerland); Oliver Stegle (DKFZ, Germany); Sarah Teichmann (Sanger Institute, UK); Richard Bonneau (Simons Foundation/Flatiron Institute, USA). The conference was attended by participants representing 46 institutions.

We received very positive feedback from attendees on the well organised and attended meeting. Examples of the feedback received include: “Many thanks to all involved in organising this workshop - as someone who’s recently started in single-cell analysis I found it extremely useful. A great selection of talks, both varied but relevant at the same time”; “As I biologist I really enjoyed the maths focus regarding the types of analysis”; “It was a very interesting meeting”; “I enjoyed the talks and the discussions”.

Symposium was well attended by early-career academics, post-graduate students, industry representatives, senior members of the community, local schools and invited guests. Evening Poster viewing, drinks and dinner event on the 18th June provided networking opportunities for attendees to discuss future collaborations. 

Workshop organisers: Din-Houn Lau
Organising departments/bodies: Mathematics, The Alan Turing Institute - DCE
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There were approximately 20-25 attendees at this workshop from Cambridge, Oxford, Imperial, Macau, Edinburgh and Exeter university.  As intended, there was a broad range of represented departments such as mathematics, statistics, mechanical, civil and structure engineering. The industrial speakers came from Autodesk (US/Canada based) and Costain (UK based). The workshop connected many of the speakers together. There is now discussion of research opportunties between industry participants and Imperial academics. Also, a sponser, World Scientific (a book publisher) is interested in writing a book about Data-Centric Engineering. 

D. Lau, main organiser commented: "This workshop has not only provided a platform for people from various fields to talk with each other, but has broaden their understanding of the field. The participants will serve as points of contact for future interdisciplinary research." 

Workshop organisers: Samuel Marguerat, Marina Evangelou, Vahid Shahrezaei and Almut Veraart
Organising departments: Mathematics, Medicine

Speakers: Mandy Fisher, Mauricio Barahona, Alexis Barr, Philipp Thomas, Irene Miguel-Aliaga, Heather Battey, David Rueda, Sarah Filippi, Mikhail Spivakov, Marina Evangelou, Filipe Cabreiro, Nick Jones, Peter Sarkie.
Participants - roughly 50% from Medicine and 50% from Mathematics.

Workshop organisers: David Ham, Gerard Gorman, Lawrence Mitchell
Organising departments: Mathematics, Earth Science & Engineering, Computing
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65 participants over three days from: Imperial (Mathematics, Computing, Earth Science, Mechanical), Airbus Central R&T, Argonne National Laboratory, AWE plc, Baylor University, CNRS, University of Edinburgh, esi-OpenCFD, ETH Zurich, FAU, Germany, Georgia Tech, GRM Consulting, GRS gGmbH, INRIA & Université Paris-Est, Institute of Geonics, CAS, ISTeP - Sorbonne University, KAUST, Kiel University, LBNL, Louisiana State Univetsity, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Quintessa Ltd, SUNY Buffalo, The University of Melbourne, TU Dresden, Germany, TU Wien, Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Leeds, University of Oxford.

D. Ham, main organiser commented: "We now have reports that our Firedrake simulation code is in use at Argonne National Laboratory and a number of other PETSc-using institutions. The exposure Firedrake achieved at this workshop is definitely a part of the reason for this." 

Workshop organisers: Gunnar Pruessner, Chiu Fan Lee, Johannes Pausch, Ignacio Bordeu
Organising departments: Mathematics, Bioengineering
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Speakers:
Mike Cates, Cambridge, DAMTP
Erwin Frey, LMU, Physics
Nathan Goehring, Crick
Guillaume Salbreux, Crick
Kay Joerg Wiese, ENS, Physics
Frederic van Wijland, Uni Paris Diderot, Physics

Participants: About 51 [ Imperial about 20, Cambridge about 7, LMU 1, Crick 2, Oxford 3, ENS 1, King’s 4, Leeds 3, Edinburgh 1]

Talks, poster presentations and informal discussions helped to develop new connections within the community. The mix of biologists, physicists and mathematicians allowed the attendees to challenge conceptions and identify new directions for future research.