#Efatec17
REVIEW TECHNOLOGY SYMPOSIUM European Forum Alpbach
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CONTENTS
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CONTENTS THE TECHNOLOGY SYMPOSIUM AT THE ALPBACH FORUM 2017 AS A COMPACT RETROSPECTIVE REFERENCE AND A WAY TO STAY INFORMED.
04 / STATEMENTS Preface: Wolfgang Knoll, Monika Eigensperger Franz Fischler, Hannes Androsch.
08 / PLENARY SESSION Boldly into a modern age.
10 / FTI TALK Output-orientated innovation policy in the age of digitisation.
10 / THE ROBOTS ARE COMING!
Adequately dealing with robotics and information.
12 / NEW MATERIALS AND AUTONOMOUS SYSTEMS Robotics opens up entirely new application opportunities.
14 / OPTOGENETICS
Many new possibilities arise when combining genetics and optics.
16 / FALLING WALLS LAB AUSTRIA
One winner and several good ideas: all tickets to Berlin allocated.
18 / SOCIAL AND EXHIBITION AIT-Garden party, #ART TEC
20 / THE NEXT DIGITAL REVOLUTION Ecologically, socially, culturally, and economically sustainable life.
20 / CHINA’S “MADE IN CHINA 2025” STRATEGY How Europe can react to the Chinese challenge.
23 / INNOVATION MARATHON
TU Austria-Teams face challenges over 24 hours.
24 / MANAGING COMPLEX SYSTEMS
Understanding and controlling systems can minimise risks.
24 / THE SECOND QUANTUM REVOLUTION? Can Europe be a leader, as it was during the first?
26 / GRAVITATIONAL WAVES
An absolute highlight: being able to hear the dark universe
27 / JUNIOR ALPBACH, OE1 CHILDREN’S UNIVERSITY ALPBACH Enormous commitment and a lot of interest from young people in public discussion about the future of technology and personal responsibility.
28 / BREAKOUT SESSIONS 13 working groups aimed at deepening current and future topics for R&D, society, politics, science, and economy.
IMPRINT Publisher, media owner, and contents Alpbach Technology Symposium AIT Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH Mag. Michael Hlava Donau-City-Str. 1, 1220 Vienna, Austria cmc@ait.ac.at, www.ait.ac.at Place of publication and date Vienna, October 2017 Production: Alpbach Technology Symposium AIT Austrian Institute of Technology GmbH Mag. Michael Hlava Claudia Klement Daniel Pepl, MAS Donau-City-Str. 1, 1220 Vienna, Austria cmc@ait.ac.at, www.ait.ac.at Printing Ueberreuter Print & Packaging GmbH 2100 Korneuburg Publisher Verlag Holzhausen GmbH Leberstr. 122, 1110 Vienna, Austria Editorial staff, Design, and typesetting Harald Hornacek, Leo Szemeliker; Layout: Repromedia/Sofia Smolyar Production management Joachim Mittelstedt
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/ INTRODUCTION
FOREWORD /
LEARNING TO UNDERSTAND SYSTEMS
H
Photo: Peter Rigaud
Wolfgang Knoll, Managing Director AIT
ave you ever met a robot? In Alpbach, the participants of this year’s Technology Symposium had the opportunity to do just this. And those who took that opportunity could see from their encounter that we live in an incredibly exciting time in the history of mankind. We find ourselves in a transition into a new technological age. Even today, robots can be found in many areas of our everyday lives. We have moved past the idea of robots being restricted to factories. Every day, we come across robotic lawnmowers or vacuum cleaners, more and more self-driving vehicles, and numerous driving assistance systems in our own cars, which contribute to improved traffic safety. The question of how we should interact with this new, almost boundless technology is crucial. The interaction between man and machine and the distribution of roles between individuals and technology. A strong economic powerhouse such as Austria, embedded within an ever more prosperous Europe, can utilise its opportunities in a way almost no other country can. The AIT (Austrian Institute of Technology) is aware of its huge responsibility to contribute to this development. This involves the big infrastructural issues of the future: decarbonisation and digitisation. We hear and read about these topics each day. Similarly, we must identify highly complex systems if we want to extrapolate sustainable benefits. The management of such systems is among the greatest challenges for society, the economy, and the government from technology, production, traffic, finance, and economy to healthcare, medicine, and the environment. The prerequisite for this is the capacity to learn to understand these systems. In this respect, AIT, with its systematic research input, is at the forefront, an enabler for our future. Although it will take years before the first quantum computer is operational, optogenetics becomes a part of our daily lives, or we can commercialise and individualise knowledge about gravitational waves (to name but three examples, which were of great interest at the Technology Symposium), the goal remains the same: To make technology benefit people. This will reduce the possibility of potential conflict when new ideas arise. And the cooperative and collaborative effect will be even more far-reaching.
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FOREWORD /
HOW COOPERATION IS ACHIEVED
T
Monika Eigensperger,
Photo: ORF/Thomas Ramstorfer
ORF Radio Director
he struggle for resources, new disruptive technologies, climate change, and many other factors such as the ever-declining curve in growth all call for new societal and economic solutions. The digital world offers an innovative approach to this. In the virtual world, where borders become seamless, sharing and working together are at the frontline. But does this new digital technology really ensure greater fairness through cooperation? Social networks, big data, and the Internet of Things offer a range of untapped new possibilities. Competition of ideas and disputes are essential for innovation and social development. And cooperation is regarded as one of the most important factors for the development of mankind and the evolution of life. For media companies, certain tasks arise from these situations. For many years, Ö1 has been a partner of the Technology Symposium and offers a media platform for debating current questions regarding the future in the fields of science, technology, and society, broadcasting these events further afield. We see this as part of our media-cultural identity, but also as an aspect of our mission to educate the public. This way, we contribute by ensuring that topics can be heard and discussed. As part of our children’s programme, every year we invite boys and girls between the ages of seven and twelve to an entertaining discussion on the “Hows?” and “Whys?” of science and technology. The chance to experience research up close and ask questions freely turns scientific topics into an appealing, surprising and, above all, understandable format. The “Ö1 Children's University Alpbach”, in cooperation with the “Youth Uni” in Innsbruck, tackled the question whether robots support people or replace them. They also looked at how modern technology can contribute to either preserving or destroying nature. Activities that encourage further thought and research and which are associated with the series “The Ö1 Children’s University” will also be broadcast to a wider public. The construction of reality in (social) media was at the centre of discussions for “Junior Alpbach”. Youths between the ages of 12 and 17 delved into the topic of “News, Fakes, and Truths” during a workshop. This is because in an open society, it is important to respect and accept the opinions of others. It is the only way of turning conflicts into long-term cooperation. Creating a public broadcaster in which everyone has a shared interest is an important prerequisite for that.
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/ INTRODUCTION
FOREWORD /
RESOLVING CONFLICTS
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President, European Forum Alpbach
Photo: ORF/Hans Leitner
Franz Fischler,
he overall verdict on this year’s European Forum Alpbach is very positive: Over the last 16 days, more than 5,700 people from more than 100 nations came to the mountain village in the Tyrol to discuss issues that will shape the future of science, politics, and economics. Public interest in the Alpbach Symposium has therefore clearly remained high this year, its 73rd. The overall theme of “Conflict and Cooperation” fuelled many a discussion and was highly topical. Indeed, when terror and populism challenge fundamental democratic values, rifts open up in Europe. The aim of European Forum Alpbach is not to airbrush ongoing conflicts, but to resolve them together. A more effective approach to resolving conflicts, for example, is part of this. Alongside the major podium debates and around 80 smaller breakout sessions, workshops and courses taught the skills required to solve conflicts and facilitate positive cooperation. These conflicts and tensions are nowhere more strikingly evident than in the field of technology. How can we exploit the enormous opportunities offered by digitisation? What is needed to prevent conflicts in society and in parts of the economy? How do we turn robots into friends we can treasure rather than into potential enemies of our personal futures, for instance in the workplace? I followed the many intense discussions with great pleasure. And I am very confident that we will succeed in moving from potential conflicts to sustainable long-term cooperation. There are a few things I am especially pleased about. A total of 720 young people under the age of 30, more than half of them women, took part in the conference events as part of the Alpbach Scholarship Programme. This is all the more vital considering that the future of Europe, digitisation, and sustainable development are particularly important issues for young people. This year, 845 speakers from Austria and around the world accepted invitations to Alpbach. Thirty-seven per cent of them were women - an upward trend. More than 120 Austrian and international partners helped shape the conference programme. I look forward to seeing you again in 2018, when, between 15 and 31 August, the European Forum Alpbach will invite you to take part in interdisciplinary debates on the overall theme of “Diversity & Resilience”.
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FOREWORD /
MORE COURAGE AND NEW IDEAS
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Hannes Androsch, President of the Supervisory Board, Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT) and Chairman of the Austrian Council
Photo: ORF/Hans Leitner
for Research and Technology Development
usiness has never been as exciting as it is today. The great strides and developments that humanity is making towards digitisation will fundamentally change the way humans coexist with one another. They will also redefine the world economy. Digitisation will contribute to the reinvention of global business. For proof, we need only look to China: The “Made in China 2025” industrial policy is nothing less than a targeted renewal of the Chinese economy designed to turn it from one based on imitation to one driven by innovation. And while the West assumes that growth and market development should be left overwhelmingly to market forces, China is banking heavily on the state. The European Chamber of Commerce’s study “China Manufacturing 2025. Putting Industrial Policy Ahead of Market Forces” is a striking demonstration of the challenges facing European industry in the next 10 years and how Europe can tackle them. Digitisation in China is growing at a tremendous pace; the scalability of solutions is almost as impressive as the enormous resources the Chinese state is pumping into expanding its firms. The result: Innovation for tomorrow is overwhelmingly taking place in Asia, with Europe leading only in a handful of sectors. This is partly our own fault. In Europe - and indeed in Austria, too - we need a greater affinity for innovative technologies that can be turned into business propositions. The education system certainly has a role to play by ensuring that people are digitally literate as early as possible, but this also requires a departure from the “splendid isolation” mindset, particularly widespread here in Austria. We cannot overcome the challenges of the future with solutions from times gone by - be it from an intellectual or a technical point of view. It makes little difference that the latest Research and Technology Report shows that the Strategy for Research, Technology, and Innovation (FTI-Strategy), which ran until 2011, helped Austria close the gap in terms of research intensity, or that, at over 3%, the share of Austria’s budget devoted to R&D is the second highest in the EU. In recent years, we have been losing ground in various innovation indexes. We are falling behind on digitisation; we are losing good people as they leave to work abroad and we are squandering part of our future. And so the road to the status of Innovation Leader grows ever longer. We still have the chance to strengthen our current efforts. But time is running out.
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/ PLENARY SESSIONS
BOLDLY INTO A MODERN AGE
Photo: Johannes Zinner
DIGITISATION IN ALL ITS VARIOUS GUISES WILL CHANGE OUR LIVES OF THAT THERE IS NO DOUBT. HOW WE DEAL WITH IT WILL DETERMINE EUROPE’S FUTURE AS A PLACE TO DO BUSINESS, AS WELL AS OUR FUTURE PROSPERITY.
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THIS YEAR’S TECHNOLOGY SYMPOSIUM, WITH ITS OVERALL THEME OF “CONFLICT & COOPERATION”, WAS AN ATTEMPT TO FIND NEW DIRECTION AND NEW TOOLS FOR A SOCIETY IN UPHEAVAL. YOU CAN CATCH UP WITH THIS EXCITING JOURNEY AT: www.alpbach.org/en/event/technology-symposium
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/ PLENARY SESSIONS
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FTI Talk:
/ PLENARY SESSION
Austria needs to find a new direction if it is to compete internationally in the digital age.
FTI TALK
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The robots are coming:
Hannes Androsch, Sonja Hammerschmid, Georg Kapsch, Jörg Leichtfried, Harald Mahrer / Chair Rosa Lyon
The new robots are designed to be like humans,
not the same as them. And humans know far too little about robotics itself.
When participants were asked to give a school-style grade to describe Austria’s readiness for digitisation, on a scale from A to D at the end of the FTI Talk, the traditional opening plenary session, Hannes Androsch replied: “F” The President of the Supervisory Board of the Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT) and President of the Austrian Council for Research and Technology Development (described by ORF journalist Rosa Lyon as the “Spiritual Leader of the Austrian research scene”) lived up to his billing once again at Alpbach Forum 2017. As always, he was a harsh critic who was quite prepared to shake things up. But let’s get back to the start of the session: For the first time, the Technology Symposium had a presenter from start to finish: none other than Andreas Jäger, chair of ORF III’s science magazine “Quantensprung” [Quantum Leap]. Although the panel included three active politicians, one former politician and a senior stakeholder, Hannes Androsch provided some protection for political decision-makers when he described “constantly calling on policy-makers to address problems” as too one-sided. So just why did Austria come 19th out of 39 countries in the OECD’s most recent digitisation rankings? According to Androsch, speaking before a packed main auditorium in Alpbach, the reason lay in the “splendid isolation we Austrians love to adopt while we stand back and see what the rest are up to”. In turn, this led Georg Kapsch, President of the Federation of Austrian Industries, to comment that “for 40 years, people in Austria have been brought up” on the assumption that “politicians will just fix everything.” Hannes Androsch identified a lack of emphasis on practical applications as a weakness in Austria’s innovation policy. Although spending on research, as measured by the share of the budget, was above three percent, “the end product is often unsatisfactory. What’s the point of having the best idea in the world if you don’t apply it to anything useful?” Jörg Leichtfried, Federal Minister for Transport, Innovation and Technology, argued for a refined and comprehensive view of the situation. While in Alpbach, he also unveiled the new Robotics Council, whose job it will be to provide the Austrian government with advice on strategies for automation and artificial intelligence across a range of disciplines. According to Leichtfried, the first thing that had to be done was to “put the threat of digitisation in perspective” for the public. He said it was already a fact that digitisation was causing lasting changes to our lives and our environment. “As a sailor” Leichtfried said, “I know what you have to do when a gentle breath of wind, which is what digitisation was for 20 years, becomes a stiff breeze. You definitely don’t try to persuade the wind to stop blowing.” The minister for Science, Research and Economy, Harald Mahrer, commented on the Austrian government’s FTI Strategy, developed
by his predecessor Reinhold Mitterlehner, in the following terms: “It was good, and the right thing to do, and we did implement it properly too, but the world is moving on so quickly”. He said the nucleus of development was now no longer the west coast of the United States and its famous Silicon Valley, but South-East Asia. “And over there nobody cares about us pussy-footing around in Europe.” Mahrer described our attitude to innovation, with its instinctive suspicion of trial-and-error, and Europe’s regulatory environment in particular, as “the Pampers position.” By this he meant: “we are more frightened than we need to be”. He continued: “the time for swimming in the baby pool has come and gone”. All of this led his government colleague Leichtfried to remark that he would “rather not visualise swimming in the baby pool with a nappy on at the moment”. Education Minister Sonja Hammerschmid praised parts of the latest school reforms, which were using digitisation as “a tool for individualisation”. Digital literacy was also a major part of teacher training, at least for those new to the profession. When asked to grade Austria, Hammerschmid declined, offering an “alternative description of performance” instead: she said she would like to see more co-operation with universities, technical colleges and, above all, with businesses “so that we don’t always have to be chasing after the latest developments in schools. If we want to be among the best countries for education, we have to have our finger on the pulse and react early to trends.”
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/ PLENARY SESSION
THE ROBOTS ARE COMING! (DON’T) BE AFRAID! Sabine Theresia Köszegi, Jörg Leichtfried, Martina Mara, Oliver Nachtwey / Chair Rosa Lyon “Robots have been around for ages,” said the German sociologist, Oliver Nachtwey, at the very start of the second Plenary Session. “Nowadays a car factory is 80 percent automated. And yet this has led to it employing more people.” Thus, he immediately dealt with the first aspect of the fear: the fear of job losses caused by increased use of robots. “At VW the number of workers and chas- >
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sis assemblers on the production line has halved. But the number of engineers has doubled.” For Nachtwey, the dangers of automation are in an entirely different area - namely the way in which the big Internet companies are shaping the market. There, a “host of under-qualified people” are being put under pressure to accept worse working conditions with the threat: “Otherwise, we’ll just get a robot to do it.” According to Nachtwey, there was a danger “of further dividing society”. Martina Mara, Head of the RoboPsychology Research Division at the Ars Electronica Futurelab in Linz, also recognises the fear among the greater public of “being dominated”. She has particularly mixed feelings about robots designed to be as human-like as possible, as produced by the Japanese media. She said she conducted a lot of research on “uncanny valley”, the empirically recorded fear and unease caused by the increasingly realistic depiction of humans in robots or computer graphics. She suspects the key to the acceptance of robots in fact lies in the concept of “informed trust”: “the machine should keep the human informed about what it is doing and what it plans to do next. Robots should be “friendly to humans, but not the same as humans”. She also raised concerns about dubious developments from a gender policy point of view, such as those in Japan, which “bring old stereotypes about robotics back into society by making robots behave like virtual wives who are supposed to address their owners as ‘Master’”. Sabine Köszegi, a Professor at the Vienna University of Technology and Chair of the newly-founded Robotics Council, steered the discussion toward the care sector, where there are well-documented staff shortages: She said there were studies to show that wheelchair users who could no longer feed themselves found it “more pleasant to be fed by a robot rather than a human.” That did not mean, however, that loving care could be completely replaced by robots. The idea was for robots to be used as a complement. On this point, Nachtwey said that humans were, by nature, “full of shame”. This was why studies have shown that stroke patients, for instance, were less ashamed when being taught to speak again by a robot as part of their recovery. The discussion then moved onto the phenomenon of “implicit social cognition”, i.e. building relationships with objects. During a study in which a remote-controlled but, for the purposes of the experiment, supposedly “intelligent” robot acting as a museum guide made a deliberate mistake and apologised for it, the participants lied about the error so as not to make the robot “look bad” in front of the person leading the experiment (the “Museum Director”). On the other hand, ORF’s Rosa Lyon, chair of the discussion, felt “uneasy” as Minister Leichtfried described how he was working to get self-driving cars onto our streets soon. The unease had less to do with the competitive advantage the Minister wants to create for domestic industry, and more to do with the feeling of losing control. Robot researcher Mara commented: “It’s just like being on a plane.” The (real or imagined) loss of control provokes an “uneasy” feeling among passengers and, in extreme cases, causes them to develop a fear of flying. Therefore, the important things for pedestrians meeting robotic cars at a zebra crossing in future would be “predictability and positive communication with the human environment”.
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New materials and autonomous systems Robots are currently used primarily as tools. But if they are to take over new kinds of work there are ethical and moral implications to consider.
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NEW MATERIALS AND AUTONOMOUS SYSTEMS Alin Olimpiu Albu-Schäffer, Pascale Ehrenfreund, Sami Haddadin, Otmar D. Wiestler EFAtec’s “Robot Day” drew to a close with an exciting plenary session hosted by Otmar Wiestler, neuropathologist and President of the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres in Berlin, and Pascale Ehrenfreund, Viennese astrobiologist and Head of the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) in Cologne. They discussed the current state of research and development in what is still a young discipline with roboticists Sami Haddadin and Alin Albu-Schäffer. Alin Albu-Schäffer, professor at the Munich University of Techno– logy and Director of Robotics at DLR, began his address with scenes from the now thirteen-year-old film adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s “I, Robot” in order to illustrate the expectations and fears which were, and to some extent still are, bound up with robots. I liked the film when it came out, it was well-researched too”, Albu-Schäffer said. But he added that he did understand that people were feeling “uneasy” about current developments. However, for this very reason there were good technical and scientific reasons to suggest that space travel could prove to be one area where robots might be used in the real world. “I also think that several robots will land on Mars before any human does”. The professor went on to show how difficult it was to teach a robotic hand, made with a collection of hundreds of motors, dampers and springs, to perform movements properly. He said the simulation of human skin with all kinds of sensor technology was another area with plenty of potential for research and experimentation. Robotics was also making major progress in surgery. However, this was another area where the public would be sceptical, so it would be important to underline the principle that “the human surgeon will always have the final say”. That being said, prospects for the use of robotics in medicine were good, especially when long distances were involved: “you could use it to operate in space.” Or: a specialist in the USA could carry out a complicated operation in Africa by remote control. For household robots, on the other hand, >
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Robots and artificial intelligence are taking over more and more jobs in our daily lives. The speed of this development is raising both hopes and fears. This is why the Ministry of Infrastructure has established the Robotics Council. It will deal with all technical, economic and societal issues related to robotics. I am delighted to have been able to recruit Sabine Köszegi as Chair of the Robotics Council. She is currently head of the Institute for Labour Science and Organisation at the Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien). On the Robotics Council she will be advised by an eight-member team of Austrian and international experts. Together with all the Robotics Council members, we are developing a concrete plan for incorporating robots into our lives. As with all forms of scientific progress, our focus must always remain on the individual. Jörg Leichtfried,
Austrian Minister for Transport, Innovation and Technology.
Photos: ORF/Hans Leitner
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the key task is currently to make them programmable by those without scientific training. In the discussion on safety, which is unanimously seen as a central issue, Albu-Schäffer referred to probabilities as a matter of fact, commenting that robot manufacturers will have to be able to demonstrate that the likelihood of a death being caused by one of their products was “less than 10 to the power of minus 19. That’s what aircraft manufacturers do”. After giving a brief overview of the history of robotics from Wilhelm Leibniz to the present day, Sami Haddadin, Director of the Institute for Automatic Control at the University of Hanover, commented that two questions must always be the focus of discussion in his field, namely: “who are we doing it for? and “what does the user need?” He said the fear of “singularity”, the term coined by John von Neumann in 1950 to describe the point at which robotic intelligence exponentially outstrips that of humans, was a topic for discussion. Asimov’s famous Three Robot Laws, first written down in 1942, remained the fundamental premise: Firstly, a robot may not cause significant injury to a human, nor allow a human to come to harm by failing to act. Secondly, a robot must obey the orders given to it by a human, unless such orders conflict with rule one. Thirdly, a robot must protect his own existence, provided that this protection does not conflict with rule one or two. Nevertheless, it had to be underlined again and again throughout this discussion that human cognition as we knew it was something quite different from robotic learning, which was based entirely on algorithms. “At the moment we are building tools. The real issue would likely only arise if and when an owner uses a robot to do something it was not programmed to do. It won’t be the experts who do this, but everyone else. It’s really down to the craftsmen to take control.”
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OPTOGENETICS Lynn Faith Gladden, Gero Miesenböck The first plenary session on Friday was to prove to be one of the most widely acclaimed plenary sessions of EFAtec 17. Lynn Faith Gladden, Professor of Chemical Engineering at Cambridge University, spoke with Gero Miesenböck, Professor of Neurophysiology at Oxford University, about a field in which the Austrian-born scientist is recognised as a world-wide pioneer, namely Optogenetics. Optogenetics deals with controlling genetically modified neurons using light signals. This discipline, which is barely ten years old, combines techniques from genetics and optics. Asked about his motivation (and while projecting a drawing of Dr. Gero, an evil scientist from the Japanese manga series “Dragon Ball” who converted himself into a cyborg, onto the projection screen), Miesenböck said: “For decades scientists have been just staring at the brain, instead of playing with it”. He showed what
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Optogenetics:
The audience were fascinated by the ability to direct genetically modified neurons via light
signals, a technique which combines genetics and optics.
might actually happen if we were to play with the neurological system as we have in the past, using a drawing of the famous frog’s legs experiment which led Luigi Galvani to discover the link between electricity and muscle contractions in 1780. “The big problem is that there’s not much left of the frog.” For that reason, it was not possible to “lay cables in the brain” without some kind of restrictions. Optogenetics worked with light, making it “cable-free and non-invasive.” However, the objects of early experiments were confined to Drosophilidae flies - or fruit flies to you and me. What are the scientific issues specific to the field of optogenetics at the moment? In his exciting address, Miesenböck explained that, among other things, optogeneticists were “on the trail of a biological mystery, namely, why we need sleep.” It was all to do with the concept of homoeostasis, or how balance is maintained: “While we are awake we collect a certain something. And when this something or other reaches a certain level, we have to sleep.” In fruit flies, certain cells control the rhythms of waking and sleeping. The dual-winged creatures can be put to sleep immediately by using optical stimuli on certain cells; stimulating others wakes them up. All of this is connected to the level of dopamine in the body. This research could lead to entirely new forms of insomnia treatment, according to Miesenböck. The Oxford professor also demonstrated further experiments with fruit flies (in the end, they had to be brutally beheaded to prove his point). In one experiment he showed that female fruit flies can be made to exhibit male courting behaviour (in the case of fruit flies, a kind of song with their wings) through optical stimulation of certain cells. As he demonstrated, this switch could in fact be effectively flicked in headless insects. When asked how this might be applied to humans, Miesenböck asserted that the procedure he had described was in fact a form of gene therapy that made fundamental changes to the genetic code. This procedure did not repair your own genes; it replaced them with new ones, something which posed ethical questions as well as technical barriers. That being said, there were areas of human medicine in which a future application might be conceivable, for example in repairing retinal damage or in treating patients suffering from Parkinson’s Disease. In this case, optogenetics could help to develop current methods such as deep brain stimulation, which is performed via the so-called “brain pacemaker”.
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FALLING WALLS LAB AUSTRIA /
CHANGING THE WORLD IN THREE MINUTES THE FALLING WALLS LAB IS A PLATFORM WHERE YOUNG PEOPLE ARE CHALLENGED TO CONVINCE A HIGH-CALIBRE JURY OF THEIR RESEARCH RESULTS, BUSINESS PLANS AND SOCIAL INITIATIVES IN A HIGH-SPEED PRESENTATION LASTING JUST THREE MINUTES. JOHANNES BINTINGER EMERGED AS THE WINNER WITH HIS PRESENTATION ON "BREAKING THE WALL OF SMELL SENSING”.
Falling Walls wants to break down walls and overcome barriers in minds, thoughts and action. The Lab, which first took place in Berlin in 2011, is an annual reminder of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The Falling Walls Lab now takes place at over 60 locations worldwide. Austria joined its ranks in 2016. The first winner was Nikolaus Pfafffenbichler (Austrian Institute of Technology [AIT], with “Breaking the Wall of Plant Improvement”). This year, Agnes Reiner (Vienna Medical University/AIT) took first place with “Breaking the Wall of Ovarian Cancer Diagnosis”. "Falling Walls is a very special event. Good research alone is not enough. It is important to bring the projects into discussion and to test ourselves against others at international level”, says AIT Managing Director Wolfgang Knoll, who brought the Falling Walls Lab to Austria as the organiser of the Alpbach Technology Forum.
ence between this and April’s Lab: this time, the audience was allowed to decide the winner. The volume of applause was measured by a professional-standard decibel metre equipped with “analogue hand gestures”. In the end, it was Johannes Bintinger who emerged as the winner. “I am delighted to be going to the Falling Walls Grand Final in Berlin.” Bintinger is convinced it will be “an exciting opportunity to see the winners from 100 national labs in person.” The plenary session was moderated by Prof. Jürgen Mlynek (former president of the Helmholtz Society and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Falling Walls Foundation), Prof. Wolfgang Knoll and Hermann Hauser (Amadeus Capital Partners Limited, and a member of the ERA Council).
TICKET TO BERLIN AWARDED
As well as the winners of Falling Walls Lab Austria, the three winners of the 2016 Falling Walls Lab Grand Final also presented their pitches: Dang Huyen Chau (1st place, Dresden University of Technology), Maxim P. Nikitin (2nd place, Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology) and Nouf Al-Jabri (3rd place, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal). The Falling Walls plenary session in Alpbach was rounded off by the appearances of three candidates from the Hermann Hauser Alpbach Summer School on Entrepreneurship - Gernot Grabner (“Breaking the Wall of Serving unmet needs in metabolic dis-
A second ticket has now been awarded for the Grand Final in Berlin - the second- and third-place finalists from the competition in April had the chance to face each other on 24 August as part of the Alpbach Technology Symposium. Lukas Kinner (“Breaking the Wall of Photovoltaics 2.0”), Johannes Bintinger and Benjamin Aigner (“Breaking the Wall of Expensive Assisted Technologies) had all provided striking demonstrations of their research projects in three minutes or less. But there was one differ-
ease”), Philipp Kainz (“Breaking the Wall of KML Vision”) and Stefan Strein (“Breaking the Wall of Doro Turbines - Double Rotation Turbine”).
FALLING WALLS LAB IN AUSTRIA TO TAKE PLACE AGAIN IN 2018 AIT Managing Director Wolfgang Knoll is delighted that the Lab has been established in Austria: “After a successful start with Falling Walls Labs in Austria last year, we are planning on running it again in 2018. As part of the Long Night of Research we are once again offering young scientists a stage on which to present their projects to a wider public.”
LOTS OF GOOD IDEAS FOR THE FUTURE
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Falling Walls Lab Austria:
Young researchers presented their ideas
in Alpbach before an interested audience of specialists. At times, it seemed the applause would never stop.
Falling Walls Lab Austria 2017 is made possible by the support of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Transport, Innovation and Technology (bmvit), the Federation of Austrian Industries (IV), accent, Austria Economic Service (AWS), Austrian Council for Research and Technology Development (RFTE), the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG), Holzhausen Verlag and TU Austria. The Falling Walls Lab Austria is organised by the Alpbach Technology Symposium in co-operation with the Complexity Science Hub Vienna.
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AIT Garden Party: For anyone who was there, this was a highlight
of the Technology Symposium, an unforgeable event. The AIT showed off the best it had to offer.
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#ART TEC: An impressively produced show which asks
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(and answers) the big questions for the future.
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AIT GARDEN PARTY
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The AIT Garden Party has become an unbelievably popular event. Even a major thunder storm at the end of the event failed to put a dampener on proceedings. Federal Minister Jörg Leichtfried referred to Austria’s strength as an exporter, which he said was unmatched in Europe and based on research and development. Peter Koren, Deputy Director General of the Federation of Austrian Industries, emphasised AIT’s expertise in dealing with “grand challenges” and joked that it was time the AIT stepped up from the Europa League to the Champions League. President of AIT’s supervisory board, Hannes Androsch, emphasised that AIT’s new structure combined with its entire team of staff leave it in an excellent position for the future. And AIT joint chief executives Wolfgang Knoll and Anton Plimon thanked the proprietors for their constant support and gave the first insights into the AIT strategy for the immediate future, to be called “Empowering Innovation”.
#ART TEC: “CITY FACTORY: NEW WORK. NEW DESIGN.” The Alpbach Technology Symposium again made use of the specially developed #ART TEC format – an interface that brings together art, technology and science. Vienna’s Museum of Applied Arts (MAK Museum) and Business Agency presented a spin-off of the exhibition “City Factory: New Work. New Design”, which can be seen as part of the Vienna Biennale 2017 and its theme: “Robots. Work. Our Future.” In the context of the increasing digitisation of our working lives and the rapid development of new technologies, new forms of work and new design strategies were very much the centre of attention. Seven projects were used to illustrate three examples of future areas of work which could have an impact on society: new creative work and silo-busting co-creativity; new ways of working in society, including working for the common good (commoning); and sustainable work, including the recycling economy and the innovative use of city resources.
Austria is developing in a fundamentally positive direction: Our stake in Horizon 2020 has risen - our researchers have already been able to attract around 750 million euros since the programme began. When it comes to grants from the European Research Council, Austria is hot on the heels of Europe’s top three countries. However, if we are Europe’s second-biggest spender on research, at 3.14 percent of the budget, but are only seventh on the European Innovation Scoreboard, our input and output are not correlating as they should be. That’s why, if we are to become a leader in innovation, we need more efficiency, more openness, more internationalism and more courage to try something new. To some extent, we are stuck in the “average trap”, and this kind of thinking is not getting us anywhere. The innovation race will be won and lost from the beginning. In order to promote peak performance in a more targeted manner, we need Photo: ORF/Hans Leitner
to place more of an emphasis on excellence and the competitive allocation of research funding in the future. The decisive factor is not the number of research facilities or institutes, but whether resources can be allocated more quickly and efficiently, whether duplication can be avoided and whether impact can be increased. Harald Mahrer, Austrian Federal Minister of Science, Research and the Economy
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The next digital revolution:
Making it all make sense: How can we strengthen
DESIGNING THE NEXT DIGITAL REVOLUTION. AT THE CROSSROADS OF SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND ART
our prosperity in the age of robotics and digitisation?
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Made in China 2025:
Susana Martín Belmonte, Harald Gründl, Verena Winiwarter, Christoph Thun-Hohenstein
For audience members interested in economic
matters, this was the absolute highlight of this year’s EFAtec: The debate made clear just how
The third panel discussion on Friday in the Elisabeth-Herz-Kremenak Auditorium was led by Christoph Thun Hohenstein, Director of the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK) in Vienna. He also wrote the closing remarks in the Technology Symposium Yearbook (“Discussing Technology 2017”, Amalthea Signum Verlag), entitled “Reason and Emotion in the Digital Age: Wake Up and Do Something!”. Among other reformulations in this article, he turned Isaac Asimov’s famous robot laws into “three pro-human robot laws”. In short, he argued that intelligent robots should above all “serve human prosperity”. Robotics, too, should play its part in facilitating an “ecologically, socially, culturally and economically sustainable lifestyle”. Thun-Hohenstein chaired the discussion in Alpbach in very much the same vein. He began by quoting author Douglas Coupland (“Generation X”): “Robots don‘t buy furniture“, “killing people with drones is cheating“, “looking backwards will not help this time“. The first contribution on the topic of how to increase prosperity in the age of digitisation and robotics came courtesy of Spanish economist Susana Martín Belmonte. She is researching new currency systems (“social currencies”) and alternative financial systems without interest rates. She said the basis for these systems was trusting that “people come together and talk to each other”. This would allow some very different ways of managing credit risks. But to make it happen, Belmonte said, governments too would have to put their hands in their pockets and provide support funding for these new platforms. In her view new definitions of work time, free time and unemployment would also be required: “Unemployment, for example, is transformed into democratically distributed free time.” Afterwards, Verena Winiwarter, Professor of Environmental History at Klagenfurt University, spoke about the “universal human currency”, namely “meaning”. “Cultures are housing for meaning”, which caused her to wonder why meaning was not included in many sustainable production objectives. She described communication as the manufacturer of meaning. Accordingly, she saw the future as being based on common good, with common goods designed according to need and, in Winiwarter’s view, to meaning too. However, she also warned of a “disorientation of the masses” in the age of digitisation, triggered by the break-neck pace of change, which could lead to hatred and aggression and thus endanger democracy. Strategies would have to be found to combat the “mind projection fallacy”, the dissemination of opinion by those who see theirs as the only valid view of the world. Artistic projects showed how fragile life often is. As an example, Winiwarter cited the “Dark Mountain Project”, a network of authors,
important China has become in the world today.
artists and thinkers who “no longer believe in the stories that civilisation itself tells us”. She said art and science should use the “blurred boundary” between the disciplines and ally themselves with one another. In conclusion the Klagenfurt-based Professor warned: “Unfortunately, what has to be said again and again is this: society is deaf to appeals such as ‘we should all change’. People have to be made to act.” In his speech, Harald Gründl, Director of the Institute of Design Research Vienna, focused on performing a detailed examination of the logic behind common good. However, he also showed his disappointment with politicians, whose goals were generally confined to ensuring that Austria was among the quickest and best in terms of development: “we need to change to sustainable goals.” Gründl showed projects in which the common good philosophy had achieved remarkable results in design, for example the Apertus Project, under whose auspices an Open Source movie camera was developed.
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CHINA’S “MADE IN CHINA 2025” STRATEGY - STATE BEFORE MARKET? Hannes Androsch, Markus Rodlauer, Jörg Wuttke / Chair Rainer Nowak The “Made in China 2025” industrial policy was about nothing less than the renewal of the Chinese economy. While the West assumes that this task should be left overwhelmingly to market forces, China is banking heavily on the state. Based on the study “China Manufacturing 2025. Putting Industrial Policy Ahead of Market Forces”, >
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the European Chamber of Commerce in China was asked what the European industry could expect over the next 10 years and how Europe could meet this new challenge. Jörg Wuttke, President of the European Chamber of Commerce in China, spoke of a “strong techno-nationalism”: China was the workshop of the world, but it wanted to be involved where the money was. “China Manufacturing 2025” showed a clear commitment to improved environmental policies, for example through the use of more electric cars and the expansion of renewable energy sources. “China wants to get out of low-end manufacturing, it wants fewer joint ventures and more domestic firms”- this was the clear message from the China expert. He said that European industry had major problems with market access. Chinese firms, by contrast, could expand in Europe whenever they wanted. This was all underpinned by a grand battle plan: According to Wuttke, China had set up a “government-subsidised funding platform”. China had invested 40 billion euros in Europe in recent years - four times greater than investment in the other direction. “The Chinese buy how and where they want in Europe - but it doesn’t work the other way around.” Wuttke called for more fairness and reciprocity. Markus Rodlauer, deputy director of the Asia and Pacific Department at the IMF, pointed out that China is “more highly digitised than some people think”. He said it had become an excellent “technology adaptor” - hence why one third of all “unicorns” (young, innovative companies with a market value of over one billion US dollars) were from China. 40 percent of global e-commerce takes place in China. There are almost 800 million internet users. “And three giant, aggressive companies are working on a new, powerful ecosystem”, Rodlauer said. He added that the digital transformation of China was already in full swing. “Dynamism and scalability” were huge, and firms wanted to be “at the cutting edge”. This development was characterised by growth potential, a strong domestic
market, strong financial backing, an ecosystem which remained robust and clear government support. With GDP growth running at an impressive 6.5 percent despite its recent slowdown, it was relatively easy to take on private and public debt. GDP is already around 10 trillion USD. But then the debt to GDP ratio was at 300 percent. “China needs to find new sources of growth, and that requires more private investment”, was Rodlauer’s view. Moreover, medium-term changes were required for the Chinese budget, since nobody could make a credible prediction as to when Chinese debt might become a problem that could have a negative effect on the world economy. Hannes Androsch, president of the supervisory board of the AIT and chairman of the Austrian Council for Research and Technology Development, became familiar with the Chinese economy first hand back in the late 1970s, i.e. “the last traces of the Mao era”. At the time, there was talk of funding for China, which was still unknown territory for Austria back then. Androsch visited China himself as part of a delegation from circuit board manufacturer AT&S. “And had we not done so, we would probably already be dead in the water”, the industrialist said. The successful EXPO strategy which had distinguished Austria out in 2010 was also worthy of an honourable mention. “In China, they took a very positive view of our involvement”, Androsch said, and underlined the good relations between China and Austria. He also gave the audience chapter and verse on his memories of his first talks with Chinese politicians in 1978. “Back then, China and India had roughly the same GDP. Today, China’s is five times bigger than India’s.” His advice to current and future policy makers? Dialogue! “Europe lacks vision and long-term strategies. We live for the day, and there is no common European overview.” If Europe is to remain internationally competitive it will need to find one - and not just as far as China is concerned. That was the essence of the discussion chaired by Rainer Nowak, editor-in-chief of “Die Presse”.
For the first time, attendees at the Technology Symposium were presented with yearbooks. Following an idea by AIT Supervisory Board President Hannes Androsch, business journalist Martin Kugler (of “Universum-Magazin” and “Die Presse”) and myself, a bilingual anthology was produced entitled: “Technologie im Gespräch – Discussing Technology 2017“ (published by Amalthea Signum Verlag). In it, top experts report on the status quo in their subject areas - from robotics based on blockchain technology and the education system to social sciences and law - and look ahead into the future. A host of international researchers from sociology, technology and IT, as well as representatives from art and culture, give impressive and, at times, very personal descriptions of their views on the state of digitisation and the consequences it might have for our lives, our economy and our future. At the same time, it was also an Photo: Peter Rigaud
appeal to show more courage and openness than is shown at times today. Digitisation, despite all the risks it carries, opens up unbelievable possibilities. We should use them. Michael H. Hlava, Head of Corporate and Marketing Communications, AIT
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STUDENT COMPETITION /
24 HOURS INSTEAD OF 42 KILOMETRES 24 HOURS NON-STOP WORKING ON QUESTIONS FROM COMPANIES AND SCORING WITH INNOVATIVE STRENGTH: THE 3RD TU AUSTRIA INNOVATION MARATHON PRESENTED A “SPORTY” CHALLENGE TO 40 STUDENTS.
Photos: TU Austria/haraldtauderer.com, Austrian Patent Office/APA-Fotoservice/Wolfgang Lackner
Eight companies presented various problems based on their own experience to 40 chosen Alpbach scholarship holders, who each had 24 hours to develop solutions and prototypes. Together with the TU Austria organisational team, consisting of the three Austrian Universities of Technology TU Graz, TU Vienna, and Montanuniversität Leoben, the partner companies formulated real challenges in the form of specific tasks. Participating this time were: • AVL List GmbH | “Trust in autonomous vehicles with AI” • Energie Steiermark | “Energy as a Service” • Constantia Flexibles Group GmbH | “The future of packaging in a digital world” • Fronius International GmbH | “Future Intralogicstics” • Liebherr-Hausgeräte Lienz GmbH | “One-hand-shopping merchandising cooler” • Logicdata GmbH | “The future workplace – a digital theatre for analog experiences” • Magna Steyr AG | “Game-changing vehicle vision for the urban environment 2025+” • voestalpine | “Failure detection in steel casting process” The students had one day and one night in their designated workplaces at Alpbach Conference Centre to pore over ideas, discuss appropriate solutions, and develop concepts. More than a thousand ideas were conceptualised and from these, eight were streamlined to be presented to the partner
companies and guests exactly 24 hours after the go-ahead was given. The commissioners from the industry were impressed, taking with them fresh input from the exhausted students, who were proud of their innovative strength and of having made valuable new contacts. Harald Kainz, Rector of TU Graz, Sabine Seidler, Rector of TU Vienna and Wilfried Eichlseder, Rector of Montanuniversität Leoben, were enthusiastic: “The TU Austria Innovation Marathon requires so much: Subject knowledge, teamwork, enthusiasm, creativity, pioneering spirit, and endurance. It is amazing to see what the 40 students have come up with in just 24 hours.” Mario Fallast, Head of the TU Austria Innovation Marathon organisational team, noted: “Such innovative results in such a short space of time only occur in multi-disciplinary teams, who can view a task from various perspectives.”
The students had one day and one night to pore over ideas, discuss solutions, and develop concepts.
The Austrian Patent Office as the first partner Even the topic of “intellectual property” came into focus this year: Am I the first person to come up with my idea? How have others solved this problem or similar ones? These are the questions that were asked the experts from the Austrian Patent Office. President of the Austrian Patent Office, Mariana Karepova: “Our astonishingly creative youngsters learn about intellectual property and respecting that of others. That is part of modern society. With 12,000 Austrian patents registered worldwide in 2016, it becomes apparent that this culture of respect is becoming more and more asserted.”
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Managing complex systems:
MANAGING COMPLEX SYSTEMS
Society demands answers to ever more complex questions. Science increasingly often takes
Simon DeDeo, Vittorio Loreto, Stefan Thurner, Helga Nowotny Helga Nowotny, former Professor at ETH Zürich, currently Chairwoman of the ERA Council Forum Austria and member of the Council for Research and Technology Development, took over the reins at the first plenary session on Saturday, the final day of the Technology Symposium at EFAtec 17. The acclaimed scientific researcher introduced the Complexity Science Hub Vienna and then went straight to the point, i.e. the complex systems, “which, as you know, are to be found everywhere in our society”. The three lecturers with her at the podium are all physicists who use the tools of their discipline to understand complex systems - the connections and interactions as well as the intended and unintended consequences of interactions. According to Nowotny, it is worth noting that “science is moving from pure observation towards intervention”, or, as Robert Musil would say, “science is the bridge between a sense of possibility and a sense of reality”. The American physicist Simon DeDeo from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh launched the lectures with a thrilling presentation. He started with the French revolution and sketched out his approach to understanding complex systems. DeDeo split 40,000 from the approximately 200,000 speeches given by around 15,000 people active in the French National Assembly between 1789 and 1791 into two categories: “novelty” and “transience”. In connection with this, he was able to disprove one of the “theories of creativity”, namely: “Be new, but not too new”. Which, he claims, is not right and should instead read: “There is no limit to the appetite for novelty - if you can accept the risks.” In similar analyses of speeches given at the Serbian parliament or as a result of various conflicts, he discovered that people who fight are not creative but that “the right kind of conflict” can inspire creativity. He claims that it is important to focus together on a problem, “get into the right mood” and thus create the possibility for synthesis. The second speaker was Vittorio Loreto, Professor of Physics at Sapienzia University in Rome. His research area is the analysis of human decisions, for example in complex systems such as public transport options. “This helps us understand how intuition functions.” From this we can develop simulation models for the planning of new underground train lines when calculating the budget size for alternative routes. At the end of the plenary session, the “spiritus rector” of the Vienna Complexity Science Hub, Stefan Thurner, had the opportunity to present his research on systematic risks in the finance system. This topic inspired the most follow-up questions from the audience. Nevertheless, the Professor at the Medical University of Vienna deduced from his studies that there is a demand for a new taxation of the finance system. He defined the systemic risk of high liabilities along with the position of a given bank in the finance network. A “system risk tax” would not be aimed at the institutions “paying the
interventionist positions.
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The second quantum revolution?:
Europe should be right at the cutting edge of quantum science in the global quest for knowledge.
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Gravitational waves: Can we hear the dark universe? It would seem that we can, according to this impressive plenary session.
tax, but rather minimising the risk”. Supervision would then be possible only if you restructured the network: “We have come to the conclusion that there is sufficient mathematical evidence to suggest that this tax would prove to be a risk-free balance in the financial system.” Leaving all fiscal policy issues to one side, we should at least recognise the risk situation. On the basis of his model, this is possible. The goal must be to scrutinise complex systems, so that the risk of a collapse is minimised.
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THE SECOND QUANTUM REVOLUTION? Rainer Blatt, Tommaso Calarco, Heike Riel, Robert-Jan Smits, Maria Chiara Carrozza The second panel on the final day of the Technology Symposium was dedicated to the upcoming quantum revolution. The question mark in the title relates to the crucial question: Where will it take place? Can Europe be a leader, as it was during the first quantum revolution, when an entire universal theory was constructed by Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, Niels Bohr, etc.? Interestingly, Erwin Schrödinger, who was also heavily involved, is >
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buried in Alpbach. Maria Chiara Carrozza, Professor of Bioengineering and Biorobotics in Pisa, was the chair of this very exciting panel. In the very first lecture reference was made to Schrödinger, as well as to the work of quantum physicist Anton Zeilinger: Tommaso Calarco, Professor of Integrated Quantum Science and Technology at the University of Ulm, suggested that Europe’s institutions have not reacted adequately since the results of Zeilinger’s ground-breaking quantum teleportation research twenty years ago. “China has now sent a satellite into space”, said Calarco. Specifically, quantum researchers such as Jian-Wei Pan at the Shanghai University of Technology have established a quantum link between the satellite and ground control, ten times the distance as previously achieved in experiments. Anton Zeilinger was once the PhD supervisor of his to-be “competitor” Jian-Wei Pan. Robert-Jan Smits, Director-General for Research and Innovation at the European Commission, underlined the importance of the EU’s decision more than a year ago to declare quantum science as a flagship project (the title was previously held by the research areas of study into the human brain and the material graphene) and to award the project one billion euros over the next ten years. “The challenge remains, however: we must also involve the European industries”, says Smits. “Only by doing so can we ensure that the second quantum revolution will take place here.” Quantum communication networks, time measurements, gravitational sensors, quantum simulators and, above all, extremely powerful quantum computers have been identified as potential applications. Rainer Blatt, Professor at the Institute of Experimental Physics at the University of Innsbruck, took the audience on a breath-taking journey to the status quo and the future. The basics of quantum technology, the entanglement of two particles, formed the core of the presentation, along with the challenge of quantum error correction. Blatt also recognises “the need for more interaction between science and industry”. But: “First, physics must take the lead, then technology will follow”, the physics professor is convinced. The idea of the quantum computer as a successor to the conventional computer “will no longer be a dream”. In reality, the situation is as follows: The IBM-Quantum computer (“IBM Q”), which can be controlled via the internet, is kept at a temperature between 10 and 30 microkelvin. “It is not yet something you can have at home”, asserts Heike Riel, IBM Director for Physical Sciences in Zürich. In normal environments, quantum bits can quickly lose their information. The IBM is, for now, “for science and playing”, but will soon be available for business purposes. We started with 5 qubits; since May, IBM offers 16 qubits, whilst the prototype for commercial purposes has 17 qubits. (A qubit is the counterpart of the conventional bit, which can also take on “super positions” between zero and one). To date, around 50,000 users are registered and 500,000 experiments have been carried out. These have resulted in 30 scientific publications. Riel continues: “We have lost the semi-conductor battle. But Europe can still win the war for the quantum computer. It is yet to be decided.”
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GRAVITATIONAL WAVES Karsten Danzmann, Lynn Faith Gladden The last lecture of the 2017 Technology Symposium was an unparalleled highlight. Karsten Danzmann spoke about gravitational waves. The presentation “Sounds from the Dark Side of the Universe” by the Director of the Max-Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics at Leibniz University in Hannover was a thriller. On 14/9/2015, Danzmann’s team re-wrote the story of astronomy. For thousands of years, mankind has looked up to the stars with an ever-improving eye, the telescope. “But something had been missing: Is there no thunder when a star explodes? Can we hear the universe? Supposedly not. There is no echo in a vacuum.” As early as 1916, Einstein had made the assumption that there must be gravitational waves. “They are distortions of space and time that move at the speed of light when space squeezes and stretches, horizontally and vertically, and changes distances. Unfortunately, the effects are very small. A length of a kilometre changes by a thousandth of the diameter of a photon, and it does this for a few milliseconds. “No wonder it took a century to be able to measure this. We simply did not have the technology.” Interferometers have existed for over 100 years, however. But it is only today that we build giant laser interferometers, which are becoming more and more sensitive. Four large systems point their sensors towards space, two in the USA and two in Europe, while others are being built in India and Japan. From 2011 to 2015, the Ligo systems in the USA were completely renovated and many parts came from Hannover, says Danzmann proudly. According to the professor, reporting on this memorable day, we could grasp the tension in space only when we were able to measure gravitational waves. Both US interferometers in the states of Washington and Louisiana were actually turned on by accident. Two young postdocs, who “stared at their screens on that beautiful Monday at AEI”, could not believe their eyes. “The signal simply looked too beautiful, as had been predicted half a century ago, when the two black holes collided.” This was followed by hectic phone calls and thousands of emails across the Atlantic. Until it became clear that: They had registered and measured the final moments of the lives of two black holes. These had collided more than a billion years ago. “We could hear the dark universe.” Danzmann played the original recording to the audience. Since then, a number of similar measurements have been taken. The next milestone is expected upon activating the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), a 2.5 million km long triangular probe, which will orbit the sun behind Earth in order to be able to listen to interference from across space undisturbed. Start date: 2034. “I know that I will be able to hear the Big Bang in the course of my career”, said Professor Danzmann. Thunderous applause. It marked a worthy and thrilling end to the 2017 Technology Symposium in Alpbach.
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JUNIOR ALPBACH – SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
OE1 CHILDREN’S UNIVERSITY ALPBACH – SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FOR KIDS
Josef Mitterer, Sara Katharina Wichelhaus / welcome Sonja Hammerschmid, Barbara Weitgruber / introduction Dorothé Smit, Alina Krischkowsky, Martin Murer / coordination Kathryn List
Simon Haller, Katharina Seeber / Welcome Sonja Hammerschmid, Barbara Weitgruber / keynote Thomas Lichtmannegger / coordination Martin Bernhofer
Our world is becoming increasingly complex and it is not easy to identify the right correlations. Young people are already challenged today by the world of new media. The construction of reality in (social) media was the topic of this year’s “Junior Alpbach” – an event that takes place annually as part of the Technology Symposium in Alpbach and features discussions about science’s latest achievements. Junior Alpbach offers young people aged between 12 and 17 the opportunity to comprehend complex technology and current issues in a practice-orientated work environment, showing them the influence of new technology. The youngsters took part in a workshop on “News, Fakes & Truths.” They engaged in discussions with their partners in the presence of education minister Sonja Hammerschmid, rising to the challenge and showing that young people can think, act, and feel in a number of areas far more critically than one may have thought.
This is Alpbach: Federal Minister for Education Sonja Hammerschmid (r.) and BMWFW Director General for Scientific Research Barbara Weitgruber oversaw a critical and clever group of youngsters.
The children’s programme at the Alpbach Technology Symposium invites boys and girls aged between seven and twelve to an entertaining discussion on the “Hows?” and “Whys?” of science and technology. The chance to experience research up close and be able to ask questions freely turns scientific topics into a fun, surprising and, above all, understandable format. This year’s OE1 Children’s University Alpbach, which took place in cooperation with the “Young University” Innsbruck, bore the title “Technology – for the benefit of man and nature?” This involved dealing with questions which could also inspire children: Will robots support or replace humans? Will modern technology contribute to preserving or destroying nature? A lecture and workshops for children created a realistic debate about technology, mankind, and nature. The activities in OE1 Children’s University Alpbach are designed to encourage further thought and research. They will also be broadcast to a wider public as part of the programme series “The OE1 Children’s University”. The children were deeply engaged in the discussions!
So much for being small: The children showed their curios-
Photos: ORF/Hans Leitner
ity and critical spirit, reaching several ‘Aha!’ moments.
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FROM VEGAN BLACK PUDDING AND GREEN TECHNOLOGIES TO SCIENCE IN A TIME OF IGNORANCE AND LEARNING MACHINES, THE NEED FOR EDUCATION 4.0 OR THE POSSIBILTY OF A NEW BIEDERMEIR PERIOD AND A PARISIAN LIFESTYLE: THE 13 TOP-QUALITY BREAKOUT SESSIONS DEALT WITH THE VARIOUS SIDES OF DIGITISATION AND THE CONFLICT/COOPERATION POTENTIAL ASSOCIATED WITH IT.
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DIGITAL FUTURES: DESIGN AS KEYS TO FUTURE DIGITAL WORLDS
THE PROMOTION OF RESEARCH AND INNOVATION IN AUSTRIA: GOVERNANCE B ETWEEN MANAGEMENT AND AUTONOMY
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Franz Aschl, Laura Devendorf, Lone Koefoed Hansen, Wilfried Haslauer, Hilmar Linder, Petra Sundström, Andrea Wald / chair Manfred Tscheligi / coordination Martin Murer The breakout session was hosted by the province of Salzburg and chaired by Manfred Tscheligi, Professor of Human-Computer iInteraction at the University of Salzburg and Head of the Centre for Technology Experience at AIT, together with his university colleague Martin Murer. A short lecture series started in the first discussion section after Tscheligi’s lecture on the topic of “Digital Contexts”, which he has also written about in the Technology Symposium yearbook, and an opening statement from Governor Wilfried Haslauer. The topic was “Designing digital futures: How to prepare for the unpredictable?”. The session included presentations given by Laura Devendorf, Assistant Professor at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Franz Aschl, Head of Management Innovation for the Sigmatek Group in Lamprechthausen and CEO of a susidiary in Ningbo in China, as well as Hilmar Linder from the Salzburg University of Applied Sciences. After the break, the topic “Next steps in cross-disciplinary practice” was discussed by Lone Koefoed-Hansen, Professor of Digital Design and Aesthetics at Aarhus University, Andrea Wald from FWF Vienna, and Petra Sundström from the Stockholm-based Husqvarna-Group.
Exploring the digital future: Cross-disciplines and experiences
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Sylvia Schwaag-Serger, Klara Sekanina / keynote Tobias Bach / chair Rupert Pichler / coordination Mario Steyer This session was dedicated to the impact of the merger between the Austria Wirtschaftsservice (AWS) and the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG) as central research agencies of international standing. After the introduction by Rupert Pichler, Head of Department at bmvit, Tobias Bach, Professor of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Oslo delivered the keynote speech on the topic “Autonomy and management of independent authorities in comparison with international standards”. Sylvia Schwaag-Serger, Executive Director of the Swedish Agency for Innovation (Vinnova), attempted to “compare the incomparable”, i.e. the promotion structure in Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Austria. Klara Sekanina of the Federal Institute for the Promotion of the Swiss Public Economy laid out the differences in scientific research between Switzerland and Austria.
from technology as the key to acceptance and understanding.
Competing authorities: The Austrian Promotion system was
Photos: ORF/Hans Leitner
discussed intensively.
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DATA-DRIVEN INNOVATION FROM RESOURCES TO STRATEGY
OPEN SCIENCE, DARK KNOWLEDGE: SCIENCE IN AN AGE OF IGNORANCE
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Andreas Hedrich, Stefanie Lindstaedt, Johann Pluy, Heike Riel, Ulrich Schuh, Philipp von Lattorff / chair Peter Koren / coordination Anna Bohrn The Federation of Austrian Industry’s breakout session dealt with large quantities of data as resources and the impact of these on the sectors of corporate strategy and public economy. Peter Koren, Deputy Director General of IV, chaired the session. Professor Stefanie Lindstaedt, Executive Director of Know-Center GmbH and leader of the Institute for Interactive Systems & Data Science at TU Graz, gave the keynote speech on the topic “Data as a strategic resource in the competition for advances in innovation.” In the panel discussion that followed, the following people took part: Andreas Hedrich (UBIMET), Philipp von Lattorff (Boehringer Ingelheim), Johann Pluy (ÖBB-Business Competence Center) and Heike Riel (IBM Research).
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Katy Börner, Matthias Gross, Jonathan Jeschke, Linsey McGoey, Roger Pielke, Victoria Stodden / introduction Harald Mahrer / chair Klement Tockner / coordination Marie-Louise Skolud The session hosted by the Ministry of Science dealt with the gap between the copious amount of possible data and information produced and actual public knowledge, known as “dark knowledge”. The session was chaired by Klement Tockner, President of FWF and Professor of Aquatic Ecology at the Free University of Berlin. After an opening statement from minister Harald Mahrer, Jonathan Jeschke from the Free University of Berlin delved into the topic. Linsey McGoey (University of Essex) followed up with the question: “What is the logic of ignorance and misinformation?” Matthias Gross (University of Jena) followed on seamlessly with: “How can we overcome ignorance and misinformation?”, with the provocative suggestion that ignorance could perhaps also be useful. After that, Roger Pielke (University of Colorado) brought up the basic issue of: “What is the role of science in today’s societies?” Victoria Stodden (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) introduced the topic “What are the opportunities and limits of open science for tackling ignorance and misinformation?”. Katy Börner (Indiana University) rounded off the session with: “What are the opportunities and limits of data visualisation for turning (mis-)information into actionable insights?“
Questioning science: Ignorance and misinformation must be overcome in order to create real benefits.
So much data: Europe’s industry must learn to make better
Photos: Johannes Zinner, ORF/Hans Leitner
use of the myriad of information it possesses.
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SECOND MACHINE AGE: LEARNING MACHINES – AUTONOMOUS MACHINES
FROM THE LAB TO THE PLATE – THE VEGAN BLACK PUDDING
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Monika Kofler, Christoph Krammer, Burton Lee, Christopher Lindinger, Bernhard Nessler, Sonja Zillner / introduction Michael Strugl / chair Wolfgang Freiseisen / coordination Tanja Spennlingwimmer Upper Austria’s Deputy Govenor, Michael Strugl, reported that his province wants to “invite the smartest minds from all over the world”. To do so, professor Sepp Hochreiter of the Johannes Kepler University was called upon “despite head-hunting attempts from abroad” to develop and lead an AI LAB, a research centre for artificial intelligence. “It is our goal to turn Upper Austria into an internationally visible region of expertise for artificial intelligence.” Further contributions came from Bernhard Nessler of the Institute for Bioinformatics at JKU Linz (“Deep learning – possibilities, chances and conflicts”), Monika Kofler from amazon.com on “Machine learning in storage logistics and strategy of topology”, professor Sonja Zillner from Siemens AG on “Towards intelligent and autonomous manufacturing by artificial intelligence for industry” and Christoph Krammer from Magna Steyr (“Autonomous Production Systems – The key for an agile production”).
A state surges ahead: Upper Austria has published a digital strategy to encourage bright minds to come to the province.
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Andreas Gebhart, Ingrid Kiefer, Mark Post, Karl Schillinger, Martin Wagner, Gernot Zweytick / introduction Petra Bohuslav / chair Claus Zeppelzauer / coordination Karin Herzog Petra Bohuslav, a Member of Lower Austria’s provincial government, said that her province wanted to strengthen support for food research, describing the technology metropolises of Tulln and Wieselburg and Food Cluster NÖ as “leaders” in the field. The first K1 competence center for Feed and Food Quality, Safety & Innovation opened this year in Tulln. Chief scientist Martin Wagner provided an insight. Also present were physiologist Mark Post, who developed the “burger from the petri dish” in 2013, the nutritional scientist Ingrid Kiefer, and Andreas Gebhart, Executive Director of VeggieMeat (products from pea protein). Vegan and vegetarian dishes were served up at a tasting with Gernot Zweytick (University of Applied Sciences Wiener Neustadt), Campus Wieselburg and the restaurateur Karl Schillinger from Schillinger’s Swing Kitchen. According to the Executive Director of Ecoplus, Helmut Miernicki: “Staying successful in competition requires close contact with top-class research methods and the readiness to bring these findings swiftly and creatively into your own portfolio.”
Meat or not meat? In Lower Austria, research priority on fu-
Photos: Johannes Zinner, ORF/Hans Leitner
ture nutrition is being set up.
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DOES INDUSTRY 4.0 NEED EDUCATION AND TRAINING 4.0?
SMART PRODUCTION AND SERVICES
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Julia Bock-Schappelwein, Sabine Herlitschka, Heinz Hollerweger, Kurt Matyas, Isabella Meran-Waldstein, Andreas Probst, Lars Windelband / introduction Sonja Hammerschmid / chair Christian Dorninger / coordination Christian Schrack Has our school system in Austria risen to the challenges of digitisation? Sabine Herlitschka, General Director of Infineon Austria, quoted John P. Kotter’s book “The power of two systems”, which postulates that new products need new systems. Minister of Education Sonja Hammerschmid defended recent reforms. The fate of the once world-leading companies Kodak and Nokia, who were robbed of their business model by disruptive innovations, can offer analogies to discussions on education. Heinz Hollerweger (Audi AG) provided interesting input on the sequential processes of implementing education. Professor Lars Windelband of PH Schwäbisch Gmünd spoke about industry 4.0 and the risks and opportunities for vocational training. Other lecturers included: Kurt Matyas, Vice Rector for Academic Affairs at TU Vienna, Julia Bock-Schappelwein from Wifo Vienna, Isabella Meran-Waldstein from the Federation of Austrian Industry, and Andreas Probst, teacher at the Higher Technical College in Ried, who introduced two graduates.
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Eric Charran, Harald Dutzler, Sandra Lamm, Sven Stegemann, Hermann Stockinger, Wolfgang Zitz / introduction Harald Kainz / chair Rudolf Pichler / coordination Franz Haas This breakout session focused on the current industrial age and its potential future. The session was chaired by Rudolf Pichler, Professor of Advanced Manufacturing, and Franz Haas, Professor and Institute Leader for Production Engineering at TU Graz. Harald Kainz, Rector of Graz Technical University, introduced the topic of smart production, followed by three kick-off presentations. Wolfgang Zitz, Vice President of Contract Manufacturing at Magna Steyr Fahrzeugtechnik, spoke about the “Versatile Factory @ Magna Steyr”, while Sandra Lamm from AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG in Leoben discussed “Electronics – smart production of already smart devices”. The topic of “Start-ups – smart from the very beginning” was discussed by Hermann Stockinger, CEO at EaseE-Link GmbH, Graz. The second half of the session opened up an international dimension: Eric Charran, Chief Architect of Data & AI at Microsoft spoke about “Beyond Chatbots - Embracing Conversations as a Platform?” Harald Dutzler of PwC discussed the ever-changing needs of consumers.
Smart production: Consumer demands and industrial enterprise are changing rapidly.
New systems: The education reform opens doors but can
Photos: Johannes Zinner, ORF/Hans Leitner
only be the first step into the future.
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CONFLICT AND COOPERATION IN THE ERA OF DIGITISATION
THE PARIS LIFESTYLE – TECHNOLOGIES AND OPPORTUNITIES FOR CLIMATE PROTECTION
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Hubert Faustmann, Walter Peer, Viktoria Weber, Christian Wehrschütz / keynote Muna Duzdar / chair Gabriele Ambros, Friedrich Faulhammer / coordination Robert Lichtner State Secretary Muna Duzdar emphasised the duality of digitisation – numerous commercial and political processes and movements have only been made possible thanks to digitisation. One cannot deny the intensification of conflict, which has been fuelled by the use of algorithms through echo chambers and filter bubbles. Hubert Faustmann, Professor of History and Political Science at the University of Nicosia, described the role of digitalisation (in this case, social media) in conflicts such as in Cyprus. Walter Peer from Communalp GmbH stressed that professionally led projects at community level lead to “more openness, better transparency, and increased acceptance among the people for whom the project is made”. For Ursula Rosenbichler from BKA, the introduction of digitisation has brought with it further issues in relation to the dilemma between man and machine. However, digitisation is also a tool that can be used to predict and develop prognoses, laying the grounds for efficient administration. Viktoria Weber, Professor of Applied Biochemistry and Vice Director of Research at Danube University Krems, claims that the volume of data and the speed at which spreading and saving them has changed is remarkable. This raises the question whether quantity leads to better quality and whether more data leads to better knowledge and expertise. ORF correspondent for Southern und Eastern Europe Christian Wehrschütz believes that digitisation has made it noticeably easier to comb through information and people than ever before. On the other hand, the possibility of manipulating information or elections is not discussed frequently enough.
Social media as a driving force: The possibility of manipulation and interference must be discussed more actively.
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Harald Hagenauer, Daniela Jacob, Carsten Nathani, Hugo-Maria Schally, Ralph Sims, Daniela Velte / chair Franz Prettenthaler / coordination Gerfried Jungmeier The Paris Climate Agreement, ratified by 195 states, aims to reduce global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the year 2100. What opportunities and conflicts arise from this? Franz Prettenthaler, Director of Joanneum Research Life, chaired the session whilst his colleague Gerfried Jungmeier introduced the topic. Daniela Jacob from the German Climate Service Centre answered the question: “How does the 1.5°C hotter world look like?“ Ralph Sims from Massey University in New Zealand spoke about “Energy demand, climate-smart solutions, and happiness”. Hugo-Maria Schally, Director-General for the Environment at the European Commission raised the topic “Environmental footprint of products and services – future challenges”. Daniela Velte (Tecnalia, Spain) spoke about “Energy lifestyles in Europe – an empirical approach”, while Carsten Nathani from Rütter Soceco AG discussed “Consumption based GHG Emissions – The Swiss Case”. The session was rounded-off with a “success story” told by Harald Hagenauer (Österreichische Post AG).
Active climate protection: Eventually, a change in our
Photos: ORF/Hans Leitner
lifestyles will be necessary to save the climate.
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CONFLICT, COOPERATION, OR BOTH: HOW DOES I NNOVATION OCCUR?
THE COMPETITION FOR R ESOURCES AS A DRIVER OF GREEN TECHNOLOGIES.
A NEW BIEDERMEIER IN EUROPE?
Harald Katzmair, Siegrun Klug, Susanne Michaelis, Roland Werner, Theodor Zillner / chair Theresia Vogel, Markus Mooslechner / coordination Katja Hoyer
Ingmar Höbarth, Silvia Schweiger-Fuchs, Manfred Stadlbauer, Helge Wendenburg / introduction Andrä Rupprechter / chair Georg Rebernig, Andreas Tschulik / coordination Josef Behofsics
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Theresia Vogel, Managing Director of the Climate and Energy Fund, kicked-off the breakout session hosted by her organisation by saying that the modern world needs both conflict as well as cooperation: Sometimes we need “conflict as a trigger, such as a new regulation or technology, which drives others out of the market”. Eventually, the next step is to rely on cooperation “in order to spread the new solutions”. This is currently vital in the energy sector. We also need language that spreads the message easily and can also be understood outside of informed circles. This was discussed by Harald Katzmair from FASResearch, the psychologist Siegrun Klug from the Institute for Sustainable Energy Use, Roland Werner from the ride-hailing provider Uber, and Theodor Zillner from bmvit. Markus Mooslechner from Terra Mater Factual Studies held the co-chair.
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In this breakout session, hosted by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management, Federal Minister Andrä Rupprechter discussed the possibile conflicts and required cooperative solutions in the field of climate strategy, resource efficiency, and environmental and energy technologies with a panel of experts. Rupprechter said that every government will “need an integrated climate and environmental strategy”. The main problem is not industry, but traffic. He also envisaged the need for legal regulations in addition to an incentive scheme. Helge Wendenburg from the German Ministry of the Environment presented the resource efficiency programme ProgRess III. Silvia Schweiger from BT-Wolfgang Binder GmbH discussed a new piece of recycling technology. Green-tech innovations in networks were the focus of a presentation given by Manfred Stadlbauer from the Economica Institute for Economic Research. Ingmar Höbarth from the Climate and Energy Fund presented an overview of global conflict potential due to climate change.
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Ulrike Baumgartner-Gabitzer, Wilhelm Molterer, Christian Redl, Christian Sagmeister, Erwin Smole / chair Andreas Lampl / coordination Claudia Riebler “Biedermeier influences”, especially in energy politics, was the topic of the 13th breakout session in Alpbach chaired by “Trend” Editor-in-Chief, Andreas Lampl. Ulrike Baumgartner-Gabitzer, Chairperson of the Board at the Austrian Power Grid, opened the session with a statement on the European crisis of trust and weighed up the balance between individual nation-state interests and common European goals in energy policy. Christian Redl, project leader of European energy cooperation at Agora Energy Revolution, asked to what extent the national implementation of the German energy revolution could contradict the European ideas of an energy union. Wilhelm Molterer, Director of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), showed how the inconsistency between economic and technical solidarity and the growing political tendency towards disintegration could be solved. Christian Sagmeister, Head of Division Railway Systems at ÖBB-Infrastruktur AG, spoke about ÖBB’s role and Erwin Smole, Co-founder of Grid Singularity, discussed blockchain technology in a European context.
Questioning strategy: Change requires legal regulation in
Achieving together: Economic and technical solidarity is
where conflicts once raged.
addition to purely focusing on incentive schemes.
needed instead of a growing tendency towards disintegration.
Photos: ORF/Hans Leitner
Conflict brings cooperation: Discoveries often take place
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2018 2017 2016 2016
Aufk lärung – Vision und Realität Diversity and2.0 Resilience August 23-25,2.0 2018– Vision und Realität 25. –27.08.2016 Aufk lärung 25.–27.08.2016 Congress Centrum Alpbach/Tirol Information: www.alpbach.org/en/event/technology-symposium/ Informationen: www.alpbach.org/tec Detailed claudia.klement@ait.ac.at Auskünfte: claudia.klement@ait.ac.at Congressinformation: Centrum Alpbach/Tirol
Informationen: www.alpbach.org/tec Auskünfte: claudia.klement@ait.ac.at
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