Where today's societal challenges meet tomorrow's technological excellence.

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When: January 18, 2024
Where: Downtown Munich, Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR)
Hosted by: Bayerischer Rundfunk & TUM
Intended Audience: Researchers (professors, postdocs, PhD candidates) with an interest in AI and/or journalism and AI.

Join us in exploring the intersection of technology and journalism. This workshop focuses on getting to know the projects and methods being used in this exciting interdisciplinary field. And, to discover possible collaborations on use cases and methods. We look forward to connecting researchers in foundations, applications, and data! We explicitly encourage junior researchers to apply.

We want to hear from you if you work falls within one of the following topics:

Deadline for registration is December 5, 2023: https://collab.dvb.bayern/x/V5IuDQ

Participants will be selected within two weeks after submission deadline.

If you have any questions, please contact Emmelie Korell at emmelie.korell@tum.de

We look forward to seeing you in January!

The QuantWorld project aims to impart knowledge of second-generation quantum technologies in a target-group-oriented way and to make it possible to experience them. For knowledge transfer, we are building a module-based QuantWorld learning platform with certification options. The central target group of our digital QuantWorld learning platform are citizens, whom we are picking up from their workplaces for a demand-oriented introduction to the topic, whereby in this project we are concentrating on the topic worlds of "medicine", "banking" and "mobility".

We are excited to be expanding the team within the Quantum Social Lab's new project: QuantWorld for two positions.

The rapid development of quantum technologies (QT) promises an economic innovation boost, new breakthroughs in science, and unprecedented solutions to global societal problems. For years, TUM and the Munich region have been a hub for innovation and research in the field of quantum technologies. This research is now complemented by a flagship project from the newly established Quantum Social Lab at the TUM Think Tank. Supported by the BMBF with a total of 1.9 million euros, the project "QuantWorld" focuses on the future of responsible technology development, making quantum technologies understandable to people where they will impact their daily work. The project integrates social aspects into the world of quantum technologies and takes new methodological approaches by involving artists in knowledge dissemination, making quantum technologies experiential.

Quantum Technologies: The Path to the Future

Quantum technologies have the potential to reshape the world as we know it. Applications range from personalized drug development to contributions, climate protection through innovative battery technologies, to agricultural optimization based on more accurate predictions of natural events. While some applications such as quantum sensors in medical imaging are already on the market, others - like powerful quantum computers and developments in quantum communication - are still in their infancy.

To harness the full innovation potential of quantum technologies while also addressing their risks, including security threats or access equity, it is essential to engage with their societal dimensions and anticipate the potential impacts on people in their (professional) daily lives while technical development is still malleable.

This is where the "QuantWorld" project comes in. Funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF),it enables citizens, regardless of their background, to gain insight into the world of quantum technologies today and prepare for the future. The project is part of the Quantum Social Lab at the TUM Think Tank and was developed in collaboration with Fraunhofer AISEC and the TUM Clinic Rechts der Isar entstanden.

Urs Gasser, Principal Investigator of the project and Dean of the TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology, sums up this challenge:"Quantum technologies can help us build a better future in many ways. However, we must ensure that societal, political, and ethical implications are considered from the outset, and technical innovations align with the well-being of people. We must avoid the mistake of only thinking about these aspects, as we did with AI, when applications emerge from the labs. QuantWorld is an attempt to be more proactive and participatory."

A Unique Educational Platform

The QuantWorld project provides a unique educational platform to introduce people to the world of quantum technologies, regardless of their prior knowledge. It combines innovative teaching methods, including artistic interventions, to make quantum technologies tangible and create a basis for a broad dialogue on the societal challenges associated with the development and establishment of second-generation quantum technologies.

Fabienne Marco, a doctoral candidate in computer science and political science who leads the Quantum Social Lab, provides a glimpse into the future: "Quantum technologies are abstract and built on complex mathematical and physical principles. Representing this abstraction requires new methods. Artistic interventions enable us to provide a new and disruptive way of accessing these technologies, initiating a transfer from the academic world to society, politics, and business. This concept will be further developed in the coming years to build an interdisciplinary network that focuses on the innovative communication of cutting-edge technologies and their applications, as well as the associated societal challenges."

Upon project completion, all suitable modules will be integrated into a QuantumBasics course, offering an overview of the fundamental workings of second-generation quantum technologies and potential future scenarios in the fields of medicine, banking, and mobility. Additionally, the artistic interventions will be made digitally accessible. In the long term, the learning experience from the QuantWorld platform will be transformed into virtual course formats to create an "immersive twin" of QuantWorld.

The project aligns with TUM's vision, committed to human-centered engineering. Thomas Hoffmann, President of TUM, emphasizes the importance of this approach: "This societal reference to complex technologies is critical for our innovation location in Munich. The QuantWorld project marks a crucial step toward a future where innovation and technology development are responsible, socially accepted, and sustainable."

For more information about "QuantWorld," please visit here.

About the Quantum Social Lab and the TUM Think Tank

The Quantum Social Lab focuses on researching and shaping the societal opportunities and risks surrounding quantum technologies, addressing responsible innovation and regulation, among other topics. It also offers various forms of knowledge dissemination regarding the theoretical and technological foundations of quantum technologies and is part of the TUM Think Tank.

The TUM Think Tank promotes societal and political change by bridging theory and practice. It creates interdisciplinary learning and experimentation spaces where stakeholders from science, society, and politics collaborate on specific questions and problems related to responsible technologies.

We had the privilege of participating in the Citizens.Lab at the IAA with our project "Mobilität.Leben." Over the past year, the team has looked into the mobility data of over 3000 participants to measure the impact of the 9-Euro-Ticket and its successor, the Deutschlandticket. Here, we share our key takeaways one year into the study:

Driving Change with Tickets
The 9-Euro-Ticket and the Deutschlandticket have played a significant role, especially during the summer months, in encouraging people to ditch their cars and opt for more sustainable public transportation options at least for some of their journeys.

Transition Challenges
However, in between the 9-Euro-Ticket and Deutschlandticket, without attractive public transportation tickets, participants returned almost to their pre-9-Euro-Ticket travel behavior. While every small step towards sustainability is valuable, we do not expect that the Deutschlandticket alone can substantially reduce the carbon emissions from the transportation sector.

Looking Ahead
A realistic cost-benefit analysis of the public transport fare innovations can be made at the end of the year. What's undeniable is that both tickets have already led to a simplification of the fare system, encouraging public transport use and savings in travel cost. It is clear that cheaper public transportation is just one piece in the larger puzzle of the “Mobilitätswende” and so the discussion continues on what additional ways we need to encourage more sustainable modes of transport.

Sparking reflection
The study was well received by the participants, who willingly shared their mobility data from the outset and remained committed to us until the introduction of the Deutschlandticket. Their feedback has been invaluable, and we're thrilled to hear that our tracking app has encouraged reflection on personal mobility habits. The study can also be seen as a signal that citizens like to be included in research projects and are eager to be part of the collective search for possible solutions to the grand societal challenges of our time.

Our study is globally one of the largest studies of its kind. It has not only advanced our understanding of mobility but also captured the attention of the worldwide transportation research community, strengthened Munich’s positioning on the global research map, and set new standards. We are proud that it has sparked public attention in regional and national media and several academic papers, bachelor and master theses – and more research is coming with several doctoral candidates using the data for their studies.

"AI applications are only as good at medicine as the data sets they are trained on. So you need really good data sets, including from our patients in Germany. These should not be biased and should meet high quality standards. Then you get the best possible medical AI. And if it has been carefully proven that such an AI application can perform individual tasks better than doctors or existing software, then we at the German Ethics Council say that it should be made widely available. There are the very first examples, for example in diagnostics in imaging" says Alena Buyx, Chair of Germany's Ethics Council and member of the Generative AI Taskforce at the TUM Think Tank.

She gave an interview to Tagesspiegel Background on Medicine and AI and touches on topics like AI algorithms in psychotherapy, and the Ethics Council's stand on electronic patient records. "Artificial intelligence is a tool in medicine", says Alena Buyx. On the question of ethical evaluation of AI, a central review board could be helpful, she says.

The full interview is available by free subscription at: Tagesspiegel Background.

“I am very pleased that, together with Microsoft, we have succeeded in developing an AI chat system tailored to the requirements of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft — and we did so in a very short time,” says Prof. Ingo Weber, director of Digital Transformation and ICT Infrastructure at the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. “We have found that many colleagues wish to use chat-based AI applications for their work and for research. However, public solutions available so far are problematic for work-related purposes, especially when it comes to data protection, confidentiality and information security.”

Read the full report here.

Weber was also recently invited to the prestigious Dagstuhl seminar on the topic of software architecture and machine learning. Read more on that here.

Prof. Dr. Ingo Weber

Already: Deep fakes are flooding the web. Some fear that AI could even help develop new viruses. "I still believe that the potential to help humanity through AI is extremely great," says AI researcher Daniel Rückert, a member of the Generative AI Taskforce on the German TV program "Titel Thesen Temperamente." He is primarily researching AI-assisted image analysis in medicine. For example, he envisions that in a few years, every primary care physician will be able to use AI to say, "You may develop a certain cancer in two years. Here's what you can do now to change that still."

Watch the whole segment (in German) here.

“We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems, we don’t even know are problems yet.“ Richard Riley (U.S. Secretary of Education under the Administration of President Clinton)

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) with its ability to generate synthetic data is considered a revolution in machine learning. The example of ChatGPT shows that such technology can not only automate text creation but also increase human creativity. Despite the current limitations and challenges associated with the use of such technology, the profound public curiosity led to a record-breaking one million users within only five-day after its launch. Since the release of ChatGPT to the public in November 2022, we are observing a consistent reduction in technological cycles of Generative AI.

These technologies hold an unbounded potential to foster and promote adaptive, cooperative, and immersive learning environments tailored to individual learners. Characterized by their ubiquity, adaptability to the learner, cost-effectiveness, they bear the potential to serve as tools for user empowerment in the large scale. Such advancements promise to bring us a big step closer to realizing the UNESCO Education 2030 Agenda, advocating for a human-centered approach to AI, which fostering inclusivity and equity in education. In line with the mission statement "AI for all", the aim is to ensure that this technological revolution benefits everyone, especially in the areas of innovation and knowledge dissemination and is used in a responsible way.

Fostering creativity and critical thinking

Hence, to adequately equip learners for their future professional and personal goals, it is crucial to provide them with competencies in addition to basic knowledge. These competencies should enable learners to compete in an environment where numerous tasks are automated, complex cognitive processes are required, personal responsibility and interpersonal skills are increasing, and interdisciplinary collaboration is the basis for solving complicated societal problems. The mandate for education is therefore to evolve from tasks rooted in routine and impersonality to tasks that are personalized, multifaceted, and creative. We need to develop strategies that promote multiple competencies beyond traditional curricula, with an emphasis on fostering creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, and communication.

We are currently facing an exciting and disruptive change in education. The most important question remains: How can we democratize access to innovation and knowledge, create a more equitable and inclusive academic landscape, and meet the demands of a world in transition? What pressing challenges do we need to address towards this goal? This is where I am also interested in a perspective from the neurosciences - from my colleague Aldo Faisal: How can interdisciplinary approaches, and in particular insights from neuroscience, help to distinguish between the outputs and utterances produced by an AI and those produced by humans?

Global discourse series "One Topic, One Loop"

Four people from four different countries and four different universities discuss a current topic in research and teaching. The series begins with an initial question to which the first person responds and asks the next person another question on the same topic. The series ends with the first person answering the last question and reflecting on all previous answers. The topic of the first season is Large Language Models and their impact on research and teaching.

Find the whole series with Aldo Faisal, Professor of AI & Neuroscience at Imperial College London, Jerry John Kponyo, Associate Professor of Telecomunnications Engineering at Kwame Nkrumah' University of Science and Technology and Sune Lehmann Jørgensen, Professor at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science at Technical University of Denmark here.

The author

Prof. Dr. Enkelejda Kasneci is the co-lead of the Generative AI Taskforce, here at the TUM Think Tank. She is also heading the Chair of Human-Centered Technologies for Learning at the TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology and is director of the TUM Center for Educational Technologies and a member of the Munich Data Science Institute at TUM. Before being appointed to a professorship at TUM, Enkelejda Kasneci studied informatics and conducted research into human-machine interactions at the University of Tübingen.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to fundamentally change the scientific landscape. In a state parliament hearing in the Committee for Science and the Arts, Prof. Dr. Enkelejda Kasneci, co-leader of the Generative AI Taskforce at the TUM Think Tank, was asked together with other experts about the opportunities and risks of AI in higher education. The discussion revolved around preparing students and faculty to use AI, the role of AI tools such as ChatGPT in writing, and the need for open and accessible use of AI tools in libraries. Despite some concerns, the experts emphasized the positive impact of AI and advocated for an optimistic view of the future of academia.

The co-leader of the Generative AI Taskforce emphasized that generative AI is steadily advancing and has ever-shorter technological cycles. This, she said, opens up opportunities for active, collaborative and immersive learning environments that are individually tailored to learners' needs, thus paying into the UNESCO Education 2030 Agenda, which calls for a human-centered approach to AI in education to advance inclusion and equity. Under the motto "AI for All," everyone should benefit from the technological revolution and reap its rewards, especially in the form of innovation and knowledge.

Basic competency goals in academic writing will still be maintained and will not be replaced in the long term. However, the introduction of AI writing tools requires adaptation, where integration should be done responsibly. Legal issues were also highlighted during the hearing, such as copyright, privacy, and liability. Universities should carefully consider these issues and take appropriate measures to protect the rights of all stakeholders, Kasneci said.

Although some students and faculty appreciated the efficiency and support of AI writing tools and certainly saw advantages in time savings, generation of ideas, and error detection, there was also some skepticism about automated text generation. Concerns about plagiarism and data protection could also lead to acceptance problems. According to Kasneci, students and faculty have reservations predominantly about the accuracy, reliability, and ethics of AI-generated texts. There could be a sense of loss of control if AI writing tools are perceived as a substitute for traditional writing skills. Therefore, she said, it is important to acknowledge these concerns and provide comprehensive education, training, and guidance to promote student and faculty confidence and acceptance.

In general, the experts agreed that a "calibrated trust" in AI is necessary in the scientific community. This means that students and teachers should be prepared for the use of AI in order to make the most of the opportunities offered by this technology. It was emphasized that AI tools such as ChatGPT can automate writing and increase creativity, allowing students and faculty to focus on more challenging tasks.

Kasneci appealed, "Education needs to move from routine and impersonal tasks to more personal, complex and creative tasks. We need to find ways to enable the promotion of multifaceted competencies beyond curricula and syllabi in higher education, with a strong focus on creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication."

She adds, "Overall, we are facing an exciting time of change in education. The question will be how do we make innovation and knowledge accessible to all, enable a more equitable and inclusive education landscape that meets the demands of a disruptively changing world."

It is not only in higher education that there is an urgent need for action. In the Handelsblatt, Kasneci recently called for a " revamping of the curricula". Teaching is "far too fragmented" - with the support of AI, it will be easier to teach "holistically" in the future. To achieve this, however, the education ministers must ensure that all teachers acquire a basic knowledge of AI.

Enkelejda Kasneci is a co-founder of the newly established TUM Center for Educational Technologies, where interdisciplinary research teams investigate the effectiveness of digital tools for learning and teaching and develop new applications. The center will bring these into practice through advanced training and by supporting start-ups.

Each week, we will introduce you to one of the members of the Generative AI Taskforce at the TUM Think Tank. Get to know their take on the latest developments within the field of Generative AI, representing various perspectives and fields.

On our first episode: Meet Georg Groh, from the TUM School of Computation, Information and Technology.

Now out on our YouTube Channel:

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