Department of CS newsletter

Published: Wednesday, 10 May 2023

Weekly newsletter for the Department of CS

Department Newsletter - Contents

News from Head of Department
News and announcements
Events
Research News
Research Funding Opportunities

[ top ]News from Head of Department

From Andrew Stewart

Summer Graduation Reminder

If you would like to attend the academic procession for our upcoming graduation ceremonies on the morning of July 17th, please remember to sign up (and order your gown if you need one) via this Ede and Ravenscroft link: https://www.enet.uk.net/

The Science Behind Star Wars

Many thanks to Zahra for organising the Atlas talk last week on the Science Behind Star Wars. It was great to see so many colleagues in attendance.

Researchfish

Many thanks to everyone for completing their Researchfish returns. We had a 100% timely return in our department. Thank you!

Collection for Mel

Finally, there is still time to contribute to Mel’s leaving gift before she leaves us for pastures new: https://viing.com/v/mels-leaving-us

Erika Buzink-Wallis

[ top ]News and announcements

New staff in the Operations Team

Dear All

Sheezah Kausar has joined the Operations Team as a Graduate Intern. She will be with us for six months as Operations Administrative Support Assistant.

Blaise is back with us as Environment Assistant for a few weeks to clear out some storage rooms, before he goes off traveling the world again.

Please do pop in to say Hello if you're passing :-)

Erika Buzink-Wallis

Bicentenary: Inspirational lectures

To mark our bicentenary in 2024, the University will be organising a series of engaging and inspirational lectures (similar to format of those in the Covid lecture series). Some lectures will be released online, and some will be held in-person. Ideally, the lectures should link to both our historical past in CS and to current research activities. Speakers can come from any career stage.

Could you email suggestions (and please feel free to nominate yourself!) by 4pm on Monday 15 May to Ruth Maddocks please?

Ruth Maddocks

Save the Date - Department Summer Social event - 19th July 2023

We will be organising a Summer Social event for the department - so save the date in your diaries!

Wednesday 19th July

Details and timings will be confirmed in due course.

Ruth Maddocks

[ top ]Events

Atlas seminar - Verification and Validation of Automated Systems: Formalising Requirements

Dear All

We would like to invite to to the next Atlas seminar, hosted by Marie Farrell.

Speaker: Professor Rosemary Monahan
Title: Verification and Validation of Automated Systems: Formalising requirements
Date: 17th May
Time: 2pm - 4pm
Venue: Kilburn Lecture Theatre 1.3

Abstract:

The VALU3S project (2020-2023) aims to improve workflows and tools for verification and validation of automated systems. Through a consortium of 25 industrial partners, 6 research institutes, and 10 universities the project has investigated 13 industrial use cases, evaluating 90 verification and validation methods and 100 associated tools. In this seminar, we will present an overview of this project, with a focus on our requirements elicitation process in the aerospace use case. Here, we have used NASA’s Formal Requirements Elicitation Tool (FRET) to formalise the natural language requirements, enabling the use of mathematically-based techniques to guarantee that the system obeys certain properties. In addition to providing requirements traceability, we have provided adaptations of software code refactorings for requirements, making requirements more manageable. We support this in Mu-FRET, a version of FRET which enables refactoring of requirements and proof that the refactored requirements have the same behaviour as the original requirements.

Bio:

Rosemary Monahan is a professor in the Department of Computer Science and an affiliate of the Hamilton Institute at Maynooth University, Ireland. She has expertise in the modelling, analysis and verification of software, working with international academics and industry to develop and employ techniques increasing the dependability of software systems. Prof. Monahan is co-founder of the international VerifyThis competition series, bringing together both academic and industrial users of tools which guarantee the correctness and reliability of software. She is currently funded by Science Foundation Ireland Frontiers for the Future to verify AI based-systems (MAIVV, 2021-2025) and Enterprise Ireland and H2020 ESCEL JU programme to improve workflows and tools for verification and validation of aircraft engine controllers (VALU3S, 2020-2023). Prof. Monahan is also PI on two Science Foundation Ireland Discover projects, producing educational resources that teach the science of problem-solving through computational thinking (InSPECT, 2019-2022) and (CoCoA, 2021-2023).

Erika Buzink-Wallis

Computer Science, Software and IP seminar Friday 19 May

Aldo Segura from the Innovation Factory and Pawel Piotrowicz will be presenting a seminar: Computer Science, Software and IP.

- Why obtain a patent for software or the outcome of computer science research?

- This session provides an overview of intellectual property rights (IPRs), the role that IPRs play in commercialisation and the questions computer scientists should ask when considering whether to apply for IPRs such as patents.

The seminar will take place in Kilburn Building 2.19 on Friday 19 May from 12.30 until 15.00.

Charlotte Hart

Advances in Data Science and AI Conference 2023 - Get Involved!

Call for abstracts deadline: 5pm Monday 15th May

The Advances in Data Science and AI (ADSAI) Conference is Manchester’s annual data science and AI conference and brings together researchers from across the broad fields within data science and artificial intelligence to explore the latest advances and to discuss important topical questions being posed by society around the use of data science and AI.

The University of Manchester has been at the forefront of research in data science and AI since their inception. In the present day, we are expanding on this legacy with significant investments through large regional and international partnerships designed to advance research and nurture opportunities for growth in the Northwest of England.

If you would like to be considered for a poster and/or short spotlight talk then please submit an abstract describing your research via EasyChair (incl. 2 pages pdf maximum). We will consider submissions addressing any areas of modern data science and AI, and we particularly welcome submissions in the areas of Digital Twins, Human-Data Interaction, AI for games, Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning.

Click here to submit – https://bit.ly/adsai2023-submit

Confirmed speakers so far include:

Dr Matthew Thomas, Lecturer in Environmental Intelligence at the University of Exeter
Professor Mark Girolami, Chief Scientist at The Alan Turing Institute
Tim Pearce, Artificial Intelligence Researcher at Microsoft Research
Matt Benetan, Research Scientist in Machine Learning and AI at Sonos
Professor Ewa Luger, Director of Research Innovation at The University of Edinburgh
Dr Maria Aretoulaki, Head of Voice & Conversational AI at GlobalLogic/Hitachi
ProfessorAndreas Vlachos, Natural Language Processing and Machine Learning at the University of Cambridge

Conference registration fee is £50. To join us and take part in these key discussions, please book your place now.

To get a flavour of what to expect, you can watch all of our sessions from ADSAI 2022 on our YouTube channel.

Sarah Chatwin

Bernardo Magri - YOSO: You Only Speak Once

Bernardo Magri | YOSO: You Only Speak Once
Date & Time: Thursday 15th June 2023 | 13.00 - 14.00
Online seminar with Q&A and discussion

Summary: Imagine a setting where whenever a party in a protocol sends a message, its IP address becomes known, and it gets immediately killed by the adversary in a DoS attack. This implies that in any given protocol a party can only send a single message at a random point in time. Can we do secure multiparty computation in this setting?

In this talk we introduce the YOSO MPC model that is based around the notion of roles, which are randomly assigned stateless parties that can send a single message for the entire duration of the protocol. We will show how one we can leverage the infrastructure of public blockchains to securely YOSO-compute any function with private inputs.

Bio: Bernardo Magri is a Senior Lecturer in the Systems and Software Security group at the Computer Science department of The University of Manchester. Before joining UoM in December 2021, he was a postdoc researcher at the Aarhus crypto group at Aarhus University (Denmark). His research interests are on the theoretical and practical aspects of cryptography and its applications.

Register here

Erika Buzink-Wallis

Digital Trust and Security Guest Seminar Series

Digital Trust and Security Guest Seminar Series

We run a series of seminars featuring a guest speaker in each session. Following each presentation there will be an opportunity for Q&A and engaging discussion. These events are designed to provide insights into key developments, challenges, and opportunities within related to trust and security in digital contexts. Our seminars are facilitated by the Digital Futures team and hosted by our research cluster leads. These events are open to both internal and external attendees and free to attend.

Robert di Schiavi | The Intersection of Psychology and Cybersecurity: Implications for Research and Practice
Date & Time: Tuesday 30th May 2023 | 12.30 - 14.00
Venue: Alliance Manchester Business School | The University of Manchester
Seminar with Q&A and lunch provided

Summary: Cybersecurity has become a major concern in the digital age, as the increasing reliance on technology has led to an increase in cyberattacks. The psychology of cyber security involves the study of the human factors that contribute to the success or failure of cybersecurity efforts. This includes the behaviour of both attackers and defenders, as well as the social and psychological factors that influence the effectiveness of security measures. Understanding the psychology of cyber security is crucial in developing effective strategies to prevent cyberattacks and protect sensitive information. Key areas of research include understanding user behavior and decision-making, creating effective security awareness programs, and designing secure systems that take into account the human element. By considering the psychological factors that influence cybersecurity, we will look at how organisations can better protect themselves and their customers from the growing threat of cybercrime.

Bio: Robert di Schiavi is a Neuro-Diverse Cyber Security Technology leader, who currently heads up the cyber security function at the PHSO. After picking up his initial toolset as a 'child hacker' he continued his exposure to technological security with a career in the military. He has developed a broad range of specialist skills in multiple domains including risk management, malware detection, analysis, programming, reverse engineering, and social engineering. He is also highly skilled in developing strategies to incorporate and deploy frameworks, and cyber security road maps.

He has sat on several boards including the NorthWest Cyber Resilliance Centre Expert Group: threat intelligence working group, and is now the Head of Technical Advisory for Bsides Lancashire. He has several publications, online, and is heavily involved in the cyber security community.

Erika Buzink-Wallis

[ top ]Research News

Congratulations to the FuSeBMC Team!

FuSeBMC was awarded at the 5th Intl. Competition on Software Testing (Test-Comp 2023) in Paris at the end of April. Full results available through https://test-comp.sosy-lab.org/2023/results/results-verified/

FuSeBMC is a permissively licensed open-source automated test case generator for programs, which employs Cooperative Verification using Fuzzing, Bounded Model Checking, and Abstract Interpretation.

From 2021-2023, FuSeBMC received nine awards in international software testing competitions (7 Gold Medals, 1 Silver Medal, 1 Bronze Medal). Congratulations to Kaled Alshmrany, Lucas Cordeiro and the rest of the FuSeBMC team.

Sarah Chatwin

UKRI Interdisciplinary Assessment College

Deadline: 20-Jun-2023 https://www.ukri.org/about-us/work-for-us/join-an-advisory-committee-panel-or-network/ukri-interdisciplinary-assessment-college/

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) are inviting applications for a new Interdisciplinary Assessment College to support the new cross research council responsive mode pilot scheme. 200 positions are available (length of term: 2yrs; time commitment: 4-8 days per year).

Colleagues from early, mid and late career stages are welcome to apply.

Sarah Chatwin

[ top ]Research Funding Opportunities

Fellowship: Turing AI World-Leading Researcher Fellowships: round three

EoI Deadline: 07-Sep-2023

Maximum award: £5M for up to 5 years

Notes: There will likely be an internal sift for submission to this call. Please contact your local RSM sarah.chatwin@manchester.ac.uk if you are interested. View the slides presented at the webinar on 6 May 2022 (PDF, 754KB). UK residency is not required for this call but you must be employed by a UK HEI.

Sarah Chatwin

Manchester-Indian Institute of Science Research Fund

Deadline: 03-July-2023

https://www.manchester.ac.uk/collaborate/global-influence/collaborations/manchester-indian-research-fund/

The University of Manchester and the Indian Institute of Science are pleased to announce a new research fund to support collaborative research projects and to build on their existing partnership.

The fund aims to establish new collaborations, facilitate work on proof-of-concept ideas, and in the long term, build international teams well positioned to apply for external research funding.

Proposals may include targeted research support such as joint workshops, researcher exchanges, and forming or developing a collaborative network. To be eligible, a proposal must include a Principle Investigator from each institution and at least one other researcher on each team. We encourage early career researchers to apply.

The fund is open to proposals across all research areas. Projects will be funded for up to 18 months starting August 2023.

Proposals with the potential for sustainability beyond the initial funding period are encouraged.

How to apply:

· read the information in the call document (Word document, 67KB);

· submit a single application using the online application form.

For more information contact:

· UoM: Alex Gaskill, International Research and Partnerships Development Manager, Faculty of Science and Engineering, email alexander.gaskill@manchester.ac.uk.

· Indian Institute of Science: Amita Sneh, Consultant, Office of International Relations, email iro.admin@iisc.ac.in.

Sarah Chatwin

JSPS London Pre/Postdoctoral Fellowship for Foreign Researchers (Short Term)

Deadline: 27-Jun-2023

https://www.jsps.org/latest_calls/2023/04/fy2023-jsps-london-call-for-the-short-term-prepostdoctoral-fellowships-for-research-in-japan-second-and-final-call-for-fy2023.html

This is the second and final call of 2023 for our Short Term Pre/Postdoctoral Fellowships.
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) is the leading research funding agency in Japan, established by the Japanese Government for the purpose of contributing to the advancement of science. Our Pre/Postdoctoral Fellowship for Foreign Researchers (Short Term) provides the opportunity for short-term visits for UK, European, North American and Canadian researchers ordinarily based in the UK or Ireland to do cooperative research with leading research groups at Japanese Universities and Institutions. The programme is designed to provide researchers with first-hand experience of the research and living environment in Japan, whilst expanding academic exchange between Japan and the UK or Ireland. Researchers from any field; Computer, Engineering, Health, Biological, Life, Natural and Physical Sciences, Mathematics, Humanities and Social Sciences etc. are eligible to apply. Awards of 1-12 months must start between 1st November 2023 and 31st March 2024

Eligible applicants also need to be either within 2 years of finishing their PhD at the time of applying to start their fellowship in Japan or have obtained their PhD at a university outside of Japan within the last 6 years (on or after 2nd April 2017).

Reports from former JSPS Fellows who have taken part in this programme can be found on the JSPS London website at the following link:
https://www.jsps.org/funding_case_studies/fellowpostdoctoral_shortterm/

Sarah Chatwin

EPSRC strategic technical platform: outline stage

Outline Deadline: 27-Jun-2023

https://www.ukri.org/opportunity/epsrc-strategic-technical-platform/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery

This funding opportunity (up to £2M fEC for up to four years) supports research technical professional (RTP) groups in the UK including RSEs. RTPs may apply as PI or Co-I.

Submissions to this funding opportunity will not count towards the EPSRC repeatedly unsuccessful applicants policy.

Scope

For over three years EPSRC has championed the role of the RTP and the research software engineer (RSE). These highly skilled and versatile community within the university sector have become increasingly prominent in the research community in this time due to initiatives such as the TALENT Commission, the Warwick Analytical Science Centre (WASC) and the Technician Commitment, among others.

Over this period EPSRC has begun to open up funding opportunities for RTPs that were not previously accessible. We are now launching this funding opportunity to fund strategic investments for systematic support, training and development to promote, enable and empower the RTP community in UK universities. These investments can be made in support of RTPs in both the physical and digital domains. Proposals should have a strategic regional or national focus, and may be based around a group of institutions or a particular scientific field or technology.

The proposals should offer a combination of personal and community-based activities and investments. You will need to describe how these investments will lead to the relevant RTP community gaining increased knowledge, skills and opportunities, and what the strategic benefit of this would be.

Examples of activities that could be considered include, but are not limited to:

training opportunities (both in terms of new techniques and career development)
secondments to other institutions or industries to train on new methods
pump-priming access for facilities
importing skills into the UK through visits to international facilities or hosting RTPs from internationally competitive institutes
raising awareness of opportunities and community development
conferences and workshops
pilot projects and feasibility studies
promotion and development of the role of RTPs in the context of universities in the UK (comparable to the ‘plus’ option of the current EPSRC Fellowship scheme)

Although not a funding opportunity requirement, applicants may wish to include a senior member of the host institution (such as a Dean of School or Pro Vice-Chancellor for example) to act as a champion to promote the RTP community at a high level.

The assessment will be a two-stage process:

outline stage (this stage)
full proposal stage: successful applicants at the outline stage will be invited to submit a full proposal, which will be assessed by an expert interview panel

A total of £6.5 million is available for this investment. Individual proposals should be in the range £750,000 to £2 million. A funding decision will be made in late 2023, with awards expected to start in April 2024.

Sarah Chatwin

UoM Open Research Accelerator Fund

Deadline: 31-May-2023

The Open Research Accelerator Fund is supporting the development of open research practice by funding projects across The University of Manchester. Applications are now open for PGRs and staff; we welcome applications from colleagues across all disciplines and research themes.

If you wish to apply to the fund but feel you will not be able to meet the deadline please contact us and we will try to accommodate you.

Applications will be considered at two distinct funding levels:

Awards up to £20,000 per annum available for large projects
Awards up to £2,000 will be available for one off activities and short projects

For further information about the application process and evaluation criteria, please refer to the Office for Open Research website and download the application form.

Sarah Chatwin

Building a Secure and Resilient World: Research and Coordination Hub

Webinar: 06-Jun-2023 1:00pm Deadline: 27-July-2023 https://www.ukri.org/opportunity/building-a-secure-and-resilient-world-research-and-coordination-hub/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery Apply for funding to coordinate activity across the Building a Secure and Resilient World strategic theme. The successful award will catalyse, convene and conduct research and innovation. The project will run for five years and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) will contribute funding of up to £5.5M for coordination hub applications.

Sarah Chatwin

Ruth Maddocks

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Last change: Wednesday, 10 May 2023 19:53:56