Want to learn about the innovative computing technologies that underpin CERN’s groundbreaking physics research? Join us for the CERN openlab summer-student lecture programme. It’s free and open to all, wherever you are in the world. Lectures will be given by CERN experts on topics ranging from high-performance computing to open data, and from quantum computing to machine learning.
These lectures are organised as part of CERN openlab’s annual summer-student programme. Due to the pandemic, this year’s programme is taking place online, with the selected students participating remotely from their homes across the globe. Between June and August 2021, the CERN openlab summer students are working – via remote connection – with some of the latest hardware and software technologies, and learning how advanced ICT solutions are used in high-energy physics. This year, 28 students were selected for the programme from 16 different countries.
“Every year, there’s huge interest in our summer-student programme,” says Maria Girone, CERN openlab’s Chief Technology Officer. “This year, well over 1000 students applied. Given this level of interest in our work – not just from students, but from people of all ages from all around the world – we’re pleased to be able to make this special lecture series open online to all.”
The full list of open lectures can be found below (all times CEST). Recordings of the lectures will also be made available.
- Monday, 5 July, 16.00-17.30 | Maria Girone: Tackling Computing Challenges at CERN
- Wednesday, 7 July, 16.00-17.30 | Flavio Pisani: DAQ-filtering data from 1PB/s to 600MSs/s
- Thursday, 8 July, 16.00-18.00 | Ricardo Rocha, Spyridon Trigazis: Docker, Kubernetes and other Cloud Native Technologies
- Friday, 9 July, 16.00-18.00 | Axel Naumann: Best practices: the theoretical and practical underpinnings of writing code that's less bad
- Tuesday, 13 July, 16.00-17.30 | Michael Aaron Kagan: Introduction to Machine Learning
- Wednesday, 14 July, 16.00-17.30 | Sofia Vallecorsa: Quantum Computing for High-Energy Physics Applications
- Thursday, 15 July, 16.00-17.30 | Paul James Laycock: From Raw Data to Physics results 1-3 (recorded)
- Monday, 19 July, 16.00-17.30 | Ahmad Siar Hesam: Intro to High-performance Computing with GPUs
- Tuesday, 20 July, 16.00-17.30 | Sofia Vallecorsa: Deep Learning deep dive
- Thursday, 22 July, 16.00-17.30 | Anna Ferrari: CERN Science for Open Data
- Friday, 23 July, 16.00-17.30 | Lukas Breitwieser: BioDynaMo: From idea to implementation
At the end of their period working with CERN, the summer students will also give five-minute presentations about what they have achieved during their projects. These “lightning talks” will take place on Monday, 6 September and Tuesday, 7 September (16.00 CEST) and are open to all. Join us to hear all about about the exciting work the students have been doing – the talks are always jam-packed with inspiring ideas and innovative solutions.
Finally, if you would like to get even more involved in computing at CERN, be sure to check out the CERN Webfest. The Webfest is CERN’s annual hackathon based on open web technologies; this year, it will take place on the weekend of 21 and 22 August. The hackathon is open to all and will be held online this year, meaning that people from anywhere in the world can take part. Find out more here.