Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (ai lab)

The Artificial Intelligence Laboratory is located in the Department of Informatics of the University of Zurich.

The goal of the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory is to foster intelligence in all its facets by promoting excellence in basic research, education, and society at large. With the ai lab’s activities the researcher hope to contribute – in small ways – to making the world a better place in the 21st century.

Swiss artists-in-labs 2010
Artist: Oliver Wolf

Swiss artists-in-labs 2007
Artist: Pablo Ventura

Brain Mind Institute

The Brain Mind Institute is located in the School of Life Sciences of the Ecole Polytechniques fédérales de Lausanne (EPFL).

The mission of the Brain Mind Institute is to understand the fundamental principles of brain function in health and disease, by using and developing unique experimental, theoretical, technological and computational approaches. The scientific challenge addressed by the BMI consists in connecting different levels of analysis of brain activity, such that cognitive functions can be understood as a manifestation of specific brain processes; specific brain processes as emerging from the collective activity of thousands of cells and synapses; synaptic and neuronal activity in turn as emerging properties of the biophysical and molecular mechanisms of cellular compartments.

Understanding information processing in the brain and its higher emerging properties is arguably one of the major challenges in the life sciences. Research at the BMI focuses on three main areas:

Molecular neurobiology and mechanisms of neurodegeneration;
Molecular and cellular mechanisms of synapse and microcircuit function up to the behavioural level and including metabolic aspects;
Sensory perception and cognition in humans. In all areas, the BMI strives to integrate knowledge gained by multidisciplinary approaches and across different disciplines and research laboratories.

EPFL is one of the two Ecoles Polytechniques fédérales in Switzerland. Like its sister institution, ETHZ, it has three missions: education, research and technology transfer at the highest international level. Associated with several specialised research institutes, the two EPFs form the EPF domain, which is directly dependent on the Federal Department of Home Affairs.

Swiss artists-in-labs 2010
Artist: Nicole Ottiger

Swiss artists-in-labs 2009
Artist: Luca Forcucci

Centre for Integrative Genomics (CIG), University of Lausanne

The Centre for Integrative Genomics (CIG) is the newest department of the Faculty of Biology and Medicine of the University of Lausanne (UNIL).

Its establishment was made possible as a result of the program “Sciences, Vie, Société”, a tri-institutional program linking the Universities of Geneva and Lausanne and the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), which aimed to develop the life sciences as well as the humanities and social sciences in the Lémanic region.

The CIG has three main missions:

The pursuit of a first rate research program in the biological sciences
The development of an outstanding teaching program
The development and support of core facilities offering cutting-edge technologies to the Lémanic research community and beyond.

The research at the CIG centers on genome structure and function in a number of different experimental systems and relies on a large number of different techniques. It is performed by an international community of scientists, yet the character of the CIG is one of an integrated research center, where interactions among groups are numerous both in formal and informal settings.

Swiss artists-in-labs 2010
Artist: Sandra-Jo Huber

Swiss artists-in-labs 2008
Artist: Sylvia Hostettler

Eidg. Forschungsanstalt für Wald, Schnee und Landschaft WSL

The Swiss Federal Institute for Forest Snow and Landscape Research WSL focusses on the use and protection of landscapes and habitats. The particular function of the research institute is to act as a bridge between pure theoretical science and the practical implementation of scientific findings. [..]

Nicole Ottiger

Swiss artists-in-labs Programm 2010
Institute/Lab: Brain Mind Institute (BMI), Lausanne: Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience
Artistic Background: Art, Teaching, Art therapy

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Oliver Wolf

Swiss artists-in-labs Programm 2010
Institute/Lab: Labor für Künstliche Intelligenz (ai lab), Institut für Informatik, Universität Zürich
Artistic background: Art
Website

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