BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:icalendar-ruby CALSCALE:GREGORIAN METHOD:PUBLISH BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Vienna BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20260329T030000 TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYDAY=-1SU;BYMONTH=3 TZNAME:CEST END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20261025T020000 TZOFFSETFROM:+0200 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYDAY=-1SU;BYMONTH=10 TZNAME:CET END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1790587800@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20260928T113000 DTEND:20260928T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Francesco Locatello\nhosted by Christoph Lampert\nAbst ract: Causality at Machine Learning Scale and ComplexityDistinguishing coi ncidence from cause-and-effect relationships is a central challenge in AI (and science): which patterns just co-occur\, and which signal causality? Statistical causality offers a rigorous framework for this question\, but it assumes clean\, low-dimensional\, structured data\, which clashes with the raw\, high-dimensional observations of machine learning applications\, including in science. In this talk\, I will present how we can now learn causal structure directly from unstructured data using deep learning\, bri dging between the modeling power of causality and the scalability properti es of machine learning. I will also highlight some cross-disciplinary coll aborations my group has built\, uniquely enabled by ISTA.  LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Francesco Locatello: Tenure Talk URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6548 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1791192600@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261005T113000 DTEND:20261005T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Friedrich Stricker & Yuval Wigderson\nhosted by Mikhai l Lemeshko\nAbstract: Friedrich Stricker |Beyond On/Off: Multistate Molecu les and MaterialsA slime mold with no brain and no nervous system can stil l remember: Physarum polycephalum reinforces the tubes of its cytoplasmic network along paths that once carried nutrient flow\, so a stimulus encoun tered minutes ago changes how the organism responds to a stimulus now. His tory is written directly into the material's structure. Synthetic material s have rarely matched this — not because they can't respond to a cue\, b ut because most are built to give one answer\, not many\, and to forget th e moment the stimulus is gone.At the root of that limitation is a simple f act about energy landscapes. In a binary switch\, a stimulus drives the sy stem along one path — on to off\, off to on — so the response is alway s the same regardless of how it got there. In a multistate system\, the sa me stimulus can drive the system along different paths depending on kineti cs\, local environment\, and history: the landscape stops being a fixed tw o-well problem and becomes something the material can be routed through.Ge tting there means tracing a single design logic across three length scales . At the molecular level\, multistate photoswitches give us control over k inetics\, absorption\, and mechanistic pathways — the raw vocabulary of reactivity. Organizing those switches within ordered\, multiphase material s – often liquid crystal elastomers – lets us govern how changes at th e molecular level propagate into changes in structural order. And by shapi ng how these material meet a stimulus — through its geometry — we conv ert molecular-scale reactivity into coordinated\, purposeful behavior at t he macroscale. Molecular design\, material organization\, and geometry are n't separate levers\; each constrains and amplifies the next\, and it's th is chain that lets us engineer function rather than just response.This cha in — molecule\, assembly\, geometry — is a first step toward a larger goal: materials in which a past stimulus leaves a physical trace that bias es the path taken by future stimuli\, built not from external control but from molecular architecture that intrinsically encodes state. Programming reactivity\, assembly\, and geometry together is how we move from isolated switches to physically intelligent\, multifunctional matter._____________ ___________________________________________________________________Yuval W igderson |Finding Structure in ChaosPareidolia refers to the human tenden cy to see patterns in unstructured chaos. Examples of pareidolia can range from the benign (seeing constellations in the night sky) to the destruct ive (gambling one's savings on the imagined patterns of a roulette wheel' s outcomes).However\, sometimes the patterns really are there! In fact\, in many cases\, we can prove this mathematically: no matter how complex an d chaotic a system may seem\, it must contain some given structure within it. In this talk\, I will give a gentle introduction to Ramsey theory\, th e fascinating area of mathematics that studies such theorems\, and discuss some of the major questions we still cannot answer. LOCATION:ISTA | Central Building | Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Friedrich Stricker & Yuval Wigderson: Inaugural Lecture URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6357 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1791797400@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261012T113000 DTEND:20261012T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Suvi Gezari Stock\nhosted by Zoltan Haiman LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Suvi Gezari Stock: Institute Colloquium | Suvi Gezari Stock URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6590 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1792402200@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261019T113000 DTEND:20261019T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Wilfrid Jean Louis\nhosted by AURAS\nAbstract: Wilfrid Jean Louis | AURAS Survey 2026: The PhD and Postdoc Experience at ISTATh e AURAS 2026 survey gathered feedback from more than 220 PhD students and postdocs at ISTA\, 45% of the institute’s PhD students participated. The survey explored different aspects of the experience at ISTA\, including r esearch and working environments\, workload and well-being\, teaching and courses\, career development\, workplace safety\, institutional support\, representation\, and track communities. In this colloquium\, AURAS will p resent the main findings of the survey\, highlighting both positive aspect s of the institute experience and areas where students and postdocs see op portunities for improvement. The presentation will also discuss difference s across tracks and identify themes that emerged across the institute as a whole. LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Wilfrid Jean Louis: Special Colloquium | AURAS | Wilfrid Jean Louis URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6614 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1794220200@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261109T113000 DTEND:20261109T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Lauren O'Connell\nhosted by Lora Sweeney\nAbstract: Ti tle | Lessons from Poison Frogs on Ecological Tuning of Animal Behavior a nd PhysiologyAbstract |Behavior and physiology are the substrates of natu ral selection. Our overarching goal is to understand how new traits in phy siology and social behavior have evolved from existing genetic and cellula r components using poison frogs as research organisms. First\, we want to understand how organisms evolve ways to evade predation by using natural p roducts that target the nervous system. Animals with a rich diversity of c hemical defenses must also protect their own nervous systems from toxicity . We recently discovered toxin sponge proteins that bind deadly toxins and transport them to specific locations in poison frogs. Such a system is ri pe for reverse engineering drug carriers to better understand how chemical defenses evolve. Second\, we want to understand how new social behaviors evolve through changes in nervous system function using a comparative\, or ganismal approach. We have established poison frog tadpoles as a model sys tem for infant social behavior\, where species have evolved new communicat ion and social behaviors based on their rearing environments. Together\, t hese research avenues are enabling us to understand the design principles of chemical defense and social behaviors. LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Lauren O'Connell: Lessons from Poison Frogs on Ecological Tuning of Animal Behavior and Physiology URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6550 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1794825000@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261116T113000 DTEND:20261116T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Vivian Kuperberg & Carla Fernandez-Rico\nhosted by Mik hail Lemeshko LOCATION:ISTA | Central Building | Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Vivian Kuperberg & Carla Fernandez-Rico: Inaugural Lecture | Vivian Kuperberg & Carla Fernandez-Rico URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6389 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1796639400@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261207T113000 DTEND:20261207T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Daniel Robert\nhosted by Scott Waitukaitis LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Daniel Robert: Institute Colloquium | Daniel Robert URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6551 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1797244200@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20261214T113000 DTEND:20261214T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Monika Visan & Simone Fatichi LOCATION:Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Monika Visan & Simone Fatichi: Inaugural Lecture | Monika Visan & S imone Fatichi URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6552 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP:20260922T011857Z UID:1800268200@ist.ac.at DTSTART:20270118T113000 DTEND:20270118T123000 DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Lora Sweeney\nhosted by Mario de Bono LOCATION:ISTA | Central Building | Raiffeisen Lecture Hall\, ISTA ORGANIZER:diana.zubcevic@ista.ac.at SUMMARY:Lora Sweeney: Tenure Talk | Lora Sweeney URL:https://talks-calendar.ista.ac.at/events/6387 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR