On March 26th, 2015, Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) launched the Sino-Swiss Laboratory for Data Intensive Neuroscience. Professor Donglin Wang (the President of CASIA), Professor Bo Xu (the Deputy President of CASIA), Professor Sean Hill (EPFL), Mr. Michael Waser (Deputy Head of Science, Technology and Education Section, Swiss Embassy in China) and several research faculties attended the opening ceremony.
Brain-like Intelligence is CASIA’s strategic research direction, which is considered to be a revolutionary scientific discipline and major driving force for the development of future Intelligence Science and Information Technology. CASIA has established several research groups and research centers related to this area, and has conducted several international collaborations in this direction.
Since 2013, scientists from CASIA and EPFL have started communications in the area of Neuroinformatics. In September 2014, several scientists from CASIA and EPFL had a joint workshop in Lausanne, and the topic covers recent advances of Neuroinformatics and brain simulation from both sides. With later concrete discussions, CASIA and EPFL agreed to establish the Sino-Swiss Laboratory for Data Intensive Neuroscience. Both sides will send scientists to the joint lab for academic exchanges and joint collaborations.
In January 2015, Professor JinghaiLi (Vice_president of CAS) and Professor Philippe Gillet (Vice-President of EPFL) signed MoU between CAS and EPFL in the presence of Chinese Premier Keqiang Li and Swiss President Simonetta Sommaruga during a bilateral meeting on the sidelines on the World Economic Forum 2015 in Davos, Switzerland. The joint lab established by CASIA and EPFL serves as one of the concrete implementations for the CAS-EPFL MoU.Both the CAS-EPFL MoU and the joint lab receive continuous suggestions and supports from the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in Switzerland.
Based on the plans for the Sino-Swiss Laboratory for Data Intensive Neuroscience, CASIA and EPFL will start to collaborate on Neuroinformatics platforms, Data and Knowledge integration, algorithms for Brain Reconstruction, Brain Atlas platforms, etc, and may extend the field of collaboration in the future.
Professor Donglin Wang noted that the establishment of the Sino-Swiss Laboratory for Data Intensive Neuroscience will enable deep collaborations between CASIA and EPFL to empower great innovations on Neuroscience and Brain-like Intelligence.
