Annual Report 2009
Events
30 Jan Dissertation: Kimmo Hätönen
On 30 January 2009, Kimmo Hätönen defended his thesis Data mining for telecommunications network log analysis at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Arno Siebes, Universiteit Utrecht, the Netherlands, and his custodian Professor Hannu Toivonen, the University of Helsinki.
17 Feb Guest lecture: Asymptotic analysis in power law graphs
Yana Volkovich, the University of Twente
16 Mar Trial lecture Challenges and Lessons Learned from Building Extensible Signaling Services for the Future Mobile Internet
Professor Xiaoming Fu(Computer Networks Group, University of Goettingen, Germany) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
19 Mar Guest lecture: Optimal Estimations
Professor Jorma Rissanen
20 Mar Guest lecture: Mobility, Data Mining and Privacy
Professor Dino Pedreschi, KDD Lab., University of Pisa, Italy
21 Mar Dissertation: Kari Laasonen
On 21 March, Kari Laasonen defended his thesis Mining Cell Transition Data at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Dino Pedreschi, Università di Pisa, Italy, and custodian Professor Hannu Toivonen, the University of Helsinki.
26 Mar Guest lecture: Embedding-based subsequence matching
PhD Student Panagiotis Papapetrou, University of Boston, USA
1 Apr Web-based teaching afternoon in Kumpula
An event on web-based teaching was organised at the Kumpula campus.
8 Apr Trial lecture: Introduction to Host Identity Protocol (HIP)
Andrei Gurtov, PhD, gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
14 Apr Trial lecture: Virtual coordinate based routing in sensor networks
Falko Dressler (Universität Erlangen) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
15 Apr Trial lecture: Automaattinen tiedon kerääminen käyttäjistä ubiikkijärjestelmissä (Automatic data-gathering on users in ubiquitous systems)
Antti Oulasvirta (HIIT) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
15 Apr Trial lecture: Virittävän puun muodostaminen hajautetusti (Creating a spanning tree distributedly)
Patrik Floréen, University of Helsinki, gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
15 Apr Trial lecture: Mobiiliviestinnän alustat ja väliohjelmistot (Platforms and middleware for mobile communications)
Sasu Tarkoma (HUT) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
16 Apr Trial lecture: Mobile Computing: An Essential Introduction
C.K. Toh (University of Hong Kong) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
17 Apr Trial lecture: Yhteistoiminnan ja yhteisöjen hallinnan infrastruktuuri (Infrastructure for collaboration and communal management)
Lea Kutvonen, University of Helsinki, gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
17 Apr Trial lecture: Interaction Techniques in Ubiquitos Computing: Multitouch Displays
Giulio Jacucci (HIIT) gave a trial lecture for the vacant professorship (distributed systems and data communications).
20 May Dissertation: Pauli Miettinen
On 20 May, Pauli Miettinen defended his thesis Matrix Decomposition Methods for Data Mining: Computational Complexity and Algorithms at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Pekka Orponen (HUT) and custodian Professor Esko Ukkonen, University of Helsinki.
27 May Guest lecture: Tapping into Reality: Smartphones Enabling New Methods for Evaluating the Usability and User Experience of Mobile and Ubiquitous Applications
PhD candidate Kasper Løvborg Jensen, Multimedia Information and Signal Processing, Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University, Denmark
28 May Guest lecture: Taking High Performance Computing to Another Level
Tei Laine, PhD, Computational Cognition for Social Systems Institute of High Performance computing, Singapore
30 May Dissertation: Tomi Silander
Tomi Silander, MSc, defended his thesis The Most Probable Bayesian Network and Beyond at the Faculty of Science at the Umniversity of Helsinki. His opponent was Dr Robert Cowell, City University, London, and his custodian Professor Petri Myllymäki, University of Helsinki.
11 June Guest lecture: Hyperbolic dovetailing
Professor David Kirkpatrick, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
12 June Guest lecture: Sensor Networks: Where Theory Meets Practice
Professor Roger Wattenhofer, Distributed Computing Group, ETH Zûrich, Switzerland
25 June Opening of Virtual Exactum
The official opening of Virtual Exactum was celebrated on Second Life. It was attended by department staff, student counsellors, alumni representatives, and tutors of first-year students.
13 June Dissertation: Jukka Suomela
On 13 June, Jukka Suomela defended his thesis Optimisation problems in wireless sensor networks: local algorithms and local graphs at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Roger Wattenhofer (ETH, Zürich, Switzerland) and custodian Professor Patrik Floréen, University of Helsinki.
16 June Guest lecture: Spatial Processes for Recommender Systems
PhD candidate Fabian Bohnert, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
12 Aug Guest lecture: Learning Bayesian networks with LP relaxations
Professor Tommi Jaakkola, MIT
20 Aug Guest lecture: Scalable suffix trees in external memory and their applications
Marina Barsky, University of Victoria, Canada
28 Aug 4th Workshop on Compression, Text, and Algorithms;
Veli Mäkinen, Juha Kärkkäinen organised the workshop Compression, Text, and Algorithms at Saariselkä.
2 Sept Guest lecture: Adaptive Entertainment
Pieter Spronck, Tilburg University, the Netherlands
4 Sept Department term opening
The opening of autumn term for the staff was organised in the botanical gardens of Kumpula.
16 Sept Distributed systems and data communications: Get-Together
Distributed Systems and Datacommunication specialization area: Annual Get-Together of Master and Post-Graduate Students, Teachers and Researchers
22 Sept Autumn start-tp event for the CS Department alumni organisation
The alumni organisation for the Department of Computer Science, TKT-alumni ry, had its autumn start-tp event. The following speakers gave talks at the meeting:
* Teemu Kurppa: Kokemuksia ja näkemyksiä mobiilistartupeista Jaiku ja Huikea (experiences and viewpoints on the mobile start-ups Jaiku and Huikea)
* Markus Mikkola / Jaan Apajalahti: Sopima.com: ideasta yritykseksi ja tuotteeksi (sopima.com: from idea to company and product)
* Pekka Aakko: Demoskene/Assembly-puheenvuoro (addressing the demo scene/Assembly)
21 Oct Guest lecture: Explicit probabilistic models for databases and networks
Tijl De Bie, PhD, University of Bristol, Intelligent Systems Laboratory
23 Oct Guest lecture: Location as key enabler for a Railway Collision Avoidance System based on direct vehicular ad-hoc communications
Professor Thomas Strang, PhD, DLR, Germany
24 Oct Dissertation: MSc Petteri Nurmi
On 24 October, Petteri Nurmi defended his thesis Identifying Meaningful Places at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Thomas Strang, PhD, DLR, Germany, and custodian Professor Petri Myllymäki, University of Helsinki.
27-28 Oct Seminar on teaching computer science
The Department of Computer Science at the University of Helsinki organised a seminar where teachers of computer science could compare notes on good methods and circulate tools and materials they had developed to other universities.
28 Oct Open doors at the department
The department had its annual open doors day.
13 Nov Guest lecture: Cultural Issues in Global Software Development
Professor A. S. M. Sajeev, University of New England, Armidale, Australia
13 Nov Dissertation: Juha Makkonen
On 13 November, Juha Makkonen defended his thesis Semantic Classes in Topic Detection and Tracking at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Jussi Karlgren, SICS, Stockholm, and custodian Professor Esko Ukkonen, University of Helsinki.
20 Nov Dissertation: Pasi Rastas
On 20 November, Pasi Rastas defended his thesis Computational Techniques for Haplotype Inference and for Local Alignment Significance at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Harri Lähdesmäki and custodian Professor Esko Ukkonen, University of Helsinki.
30 Nov Dissertation: Petri Kontkanen
On 30 November, Petri Kontkanen defended his thesis Computationally Effcient Methods for MDL-Optimal Density Estimation and Data Clustering at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Kenji Yamanishi, University of Tokyo, and custodian Professor Petri Myllymäki, University of Helsinki.
2 Dec Guest lecture / HIIT seminar: Additive noise models for causal inference
Joris Mooij, PhD, Max-Planck-Institut for Biological Cybernetics, Dept. Schölkopf, Tübingen, Germany
12 Dec Dissertation: Tommi Mononen
On 12 December, Tommi Mononen defended his dissertation Computing the Stochastic Complexity of Simple Probabilistic Graphical Models at the Faculty of Science at the University of Helsinki. His opponent was Professor Ioan Tabus, Tampere University of Technology, and custodian Professor Petri Myllymäki, University of Helsinki.
14 Dec Guest lecture: Sequence prediction for arbitrary classes of processes
Daniil Ryabko, PhD, INRIA
15 Dec Guest lecture: Computer Science Concepts Come Alive
Professor Susan Rodger, Computer Science Department at Duke University