An new online course on networks – Starting March 25!

https://lnkd.in/eb-S_Ns

The Online school is a theoretical and practical introduction to Network science. Students will learn the basic concepts and methods to analyze and understand complex networks, starting with the fundamentals of network science, and culminating with the latest applications in infrastructure resilience, physiological networks and the microbiome. The school brings together some of the current leaders in the field, all part of the Bar-Ilan Network Science Center team. Students will learn about the universal language describing social, biological and technological systems: Basic applications of graph theory to modern scientific challenges. What makes networks robust and resilient. How to model interdependencies between networks. How do information (and epidemics) spread in complex networks. State-of-the-art applications from brain to power systems.

Recent report written by Dr. Ittai Bar-Siman-Tov on “Parliamentary Activity and Legislative Oversight during the Coronavirus Pandemic -A Comparative Overview” See – https://lnkd.in/eQuEmvH

Abstract:

The novel Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is extremely contagious and currently incurable. Hence, much of the efforts to contain the pandemic have focused on social distancing, prohibiting gatherings and even curfews. The Coronavirus poses a new dual challenge for legislatures. First, the Coronavirus, and the measures taken to contain its spread, make it difficult and even dangerous for parliaments to operate, given that legislatures are by their very nature large multi-member bodies whose operation requires assembling a large group of people together to deliberate and vote. Second, the Coronavirus pandemic creates a sense of emergency that empowers the executive branch and emboldens it to assert greater authority at the expenses of the legislature.

Despite these challenges, the continued operation of legislatures throughout the Coronavirus crisis, and particularly the maintenance of legislative oversight of the executive, has never been more vital. Legislatures have a crucial role in checking the executive and ensuring that countries will not lose their constitutional and democratic values in the process of managing the Coronavirus crisis.

This report begins by explicating the novel dual challenge the Coronavirus pandemic poses for legislatures. It than focuses on elaborating on the unique challenge currently faced by the Israeli Parliament. It explains how the unique combination between the Coronavirus pandemic and the complex political situation in Israel, has made the issue of parliamentary operation during the Coronavirus pandemic particularly acute and urgent.  

Against this background, this report examines whether and how parliaments in other democracies are operating during this crucial period of the evolving Coronavirus pandemic. Drawing on a combination of two main types of sources – a network of expert academics and a network of parliamentary research centers – it presents a novel and timely comparative overview about current parliamentary activity during the Coronavirus pandemic. The report covers 26 democratic parliaments from Europe, North America, Asia, Israel and Australia. It finds that most parliaments continue to operate during the Coronavirus crisis (including in countries in which the pandemic is quite substantial and in countries where legislators themselves were among those diagnosed with the coronavirus). It also finds that even though some parliaments continue with business as usual, many parliaments are beginning to modify their operation, and generally show an ability to adapt to meet the Coronavirus challenge.

Vatat Call for Phd and post-doc scholarships:

• מלגות ות”ת לדוקטורנטים מצטיינים במדעי הנתונים – due March 19
• קול קורא למלגות הות”ת לבתר-דוקטורטים ישראלים היוצאים לחו”ל  – due March 19

Upcoming Talks and Events:

• March 3, 14:00-15:00. “Explaining visual understanding: Learn to reason about the perceived world” – Talk by Prof. Gal Chechik at The Israel Statistical Association workshop: Explainable AI (XAI). Facebook Tel-Aviv.
• March 3 – 4: Common Mechanism in Alzheimer’s diseases and T2D uncovered by Big Data and Deep Learning. Workshop. The Azrieli Faculty of Medicine, Safed. 
• March 5, 11:00-12:00: “What’s wrong with Hebrew NLP? And How to Make it Right”. Talk by Prof. Reut Tsarfaty at AI FOR HUMAN LANGUAGE 2020. Rokach blvd. 101, TEL AVIV.
• March 19, 10:30 – 11:30: Impactful AI: Creating the World We Want to See. Special Talk by Dr. Richard Socher, Salesforce’s Chief Scientist. At Bar-Ilan Campus.

Other Calls:

• The Israeli Center for Promoting Research in Smart Transportation – call for MS/PHD scholarships and call for travel grants – due March 8
• Facebook – call for research proposals: Statistics for Improving Insights, Models, and Decisions  (topics include Anomaly Detection and Interpretability techniques for AI models) – due March 25.

DSI Call for Research Grants:

• We had 57 proposals submitted (41 regular, 16 small) by 74 PIs from 23 departments.  
• List of accepted grants expected to be published March 4, 2020. 

Vatat Call for Phd and post-doc scholarships:

• מלגות ות”ת לדוקטורנטים מצטיינים במדעי הנתונים – due March 19
• קול קורא למלגות הות”ת לבתר-דוקטורטים ישראלים היוצאים לחו”ל  – due March 19

Dr. Milana Frenkel-Morgenstern

DSI Member Spotlight:

Recent Media coverage

• https://www.google.co.il/amp/s/m.jpost.com/HEALTH-SCIENCE/Israeli-scientists-assist-unprecedented-mapping-of-cancer-genome-616744/amp
• https://www.google.co.il/amp/s/israelnoticias.com/tecnologia/cientificos-mapeo-genoma-cancer/
• https://www.jpost.com/HEALTH-SCIENCE/Bar-Ilan-U-develops-information-mining-tool-for-cancer-research-601695https://phys-org.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/phys.org/news/2019-08-tool-scientific-texts-fusion-protein.amp
• https://www.jewishpress.com/news/on-campus/new-tool-developed-at-bar-ilan-may-aid-personalized-cancer-treatments/2019/09/10/
• https://www1.biu.ac.il/indexE.php?id=33&pt=20&pid=117&level=2&cPath=33&type=1&news=3364

The BIU LawData Lab at Bar Ilan-University Faculty of Law is now accepting applications for a post-doctoral fellowship, starting Spring 2020.

Full details below.

The BIU LawData Lab (BIU Innovation Lab for Law, Data-Science and Digital Ethics at Bar Ilan-University Faculty of Law) is seeking candidates for a new post-doctoral fellowship.

Eligibility:

–          PhD/JSD graduates or candidates who have submitted their doctoral dissertation.

–          Candidates should have a JSD or PhD in law OR an LL.B/J.D + PhD in a related field (e.g., public policy, regulation, computer science, data science)

–          Candidates should have a background in at least one of the Lab’s areas of work: law and technology, law and data science, law and artificial intelligence, ethics and technology, data governance.

Fellowship Terms:

–          Duration: Flexible start date during March or April 2020. End: October 2020, but suitable candidates may be offered the option to extend the position until September 2021.

–          Funding: A fellowship of 8,000 NIS per month.

–          Responsibilities: the fellow will take part in the lab’s research projects and activities (including conferences and seminars) and will assist in the administration of the lab. In addition, the fellow is encouraged to lead independent research on topics related to the Lab’s work and to collaborate with affiliated faculty members.

How to apply:

–          Please send a CV (including a list of publications), 2-3 recommendation letters, and a short statement of interest and research agenda to ravit.engelsman@biu.ac.il. Relevant candidates will be invited for an interview.

–          Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the fellowship position is filled.

About the BIU LawData Lab:

The BIU Innovation Lab for Law, Data-Science and Digital Ethics at Bar Ilan-University Faculty of Law focuses on two primary tracks: (1) data-driven legal research using various data-science methods (e.g., ML, NLP, social network analysis); (2) normative and ethical analysis, focusing on legal and regulatory aspects of big data, data analytics and AI, and on ensuring proper data governance. The lab is based on an interdisciplinary collaboration between legal researchers from the BIU Faculty of Law and data scientists from the BIU Data Science Institute and other affiliated BIU departments. It is also based on an international collaboration as part of the Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence on Digital Governance (DIGOV)

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