The 6th edition of “Ciência 2018” – the Science and Technology Summit in Portugal – is considered one of the largest science event in Portugal that brings together national and international speakers and participants every year.
Many members of Técnico community attended the event on the second day, July 3. According to the minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education, professor Manuel Heitor “more than 1250 people attended this event today”. The minister also stressed that “I am very proud to be part of this event because it allows us to think together and to shape the future”.
“I am proud of the Portuguese scientists. I say it here, but most of the times I say it abroad” said the European Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation, Carlos Moedas, who also shared: “A colleague from Austria told me that they have very good researchers, but the best researcher of all is from Portugal. He graduated from Técnico, he is only 33 years old and his name is Nuno Maulide. He is an example to us all, so that there is no doubt that we are really very good”. Exploring the future of science in Europe, the commissioner made it clear that one of the main lines of action will be to foster the link between science and society. “We need a new social contract between science, governments and citizens, in order to bring people closer to science”.
According to Maria Manuel Leitão Marques, minister of the Presidency and Administrative Modernisation, “we want to promote a culture that encourages experimentation and innovation”. The minister ended her speech making an appeal to the scientific community, “make public administration a project partner, thus making it possible to embrace the new digital frontiers”.
Professor Doug Sicker, from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) spoke about the “New frontiers of the digital age in Europe and in the World” and made a brief explanation about the security in the Internet of Things. “There are a lot of factors that can make a system vulnerable such as poorly written code or the unexpected interdependencies”, said the professor. Professor Isabel Trancoso, from Técnico, addressed the way virtual assistants have changed the way we interact over time and spoke about the impact of Machine Learning in this area, which allows “the creation of deep neural networks, a virtually unlimited amount of data, expanding storage and computing itself”.
Also professor Mário Pimenta, from LIP – Laboratório de Instrumentação e Física de Partículas and professor Inês Martins, from CQE – Centro de Química Estrutural, participated in the debates held during this second day. Several research units were invited to participate in the event. Técnico was represented by Vizzi, the robot form ISR – Institute for Systems and Robotics.
