Past Outreach Activities

Girls’ Day 2025

What is intelligence, and how can research contribute to improving current technologies with insights from this work? At the Girls’ Day 2025  aspiring young female scientists has found out how scientists from various disciplines research the topic of intelligence. Through interactive exchanges, they learned how researchers work to understand intelligence from different perspectives. After a brief exchange, the participants visited the researchers’ labs in two groups and experienced firsthand how intelligent robots work. They also participated in a workshop where they can transform their impressions into a puzzle model.

Berlin Science Week 2024: Science Slam of the Berlin Clusters of Excellence

Every year, Berlin Science Week transforms the city into a vibrant festival of scientific ideas, exploration, and experimentation. From 1 to 10 November, 2024, the festival once again brought together thousands of minds under the theme “COMMON GROUND”, reminding us all that science has the unique power to bridge divides, foster dialogue, and bring people together. In this year’s Science Slam of the Berlin Clusters of Excellence, researchers brought their work to life with everything from costumes and props to experimental setups. For SCIoI, our member Anna Lange joined the stage with her talk “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to Social Robots” on human-robot interactions, a delightful mix of humor and heartfelt storytelling, lefting the audience inspired and cheering.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2024: Excellent Pub Quiz

The Science Pub Quiz organized by the seven Berlin Clusters of Excellence has now become a tradition at the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften. In 2024, the groups from the  seven Berlin Clusters have entertained the audiance by answering questions spanning the various topics of the including material science, chemistry, neuroscience and, of course, intelligence science. Questions such as “What is dihydrogen monoxide?” and “How many AI patents were registered in 2023?” kept participants busy for an hour each round, and winners included families, groups of friends, and even the LNDW’s “Getränke-Team!” The Pub Quiz is always a great occasion for people to gather, spend time with their families, and share a drink while thinking of science and learning about our Clusters’ work.

Girls’ Day 2024

On Girl’s Day 2024, our members Palina Bartashevich, Asieh Daneshi, Soledad Traverso, Anna Lange, and David Mezey, with the help of our lab managers Matthis Kaiser, Michael Brück, and Rolf Struikmans, have shown the girls around SCIoI, offering hands-on demonstrations on topics such as Virtual Reality, interacting with robots, fish swarms, and mouse lockboxes. The girls will also visit the laser cutter and get to build their own 3D puzzle robot.

Berlin Science Week 2023

SCIoI has participated at the Berlin Science Week (BSW) 2023, under the theme “Dare to Know” with two performances, and also won a prize. Read more about it here.

• David Bierbach, “From chaos to order: How large collectives benefit from being in a critical state between complete disorder and strong structure”
• Intercluster Science Slam

Airbound: Sensing Collective Futures

The exhibition »Airbound« features climate fictions and speculative everyday scenarios – developed in an open process by collaborators from society, science, and design. Through speculative installations, »Airbound« provides space to discuss urgent geopolitical issues. At stake are the contested knowledge of the climate, the destructive use of joint resources, and the injustices that are inherently connected. Air is critically bound to these – as collective, active, and intelligent material.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2023

This year, SCIoI had a long and exciting Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften. Our Open Lab event at MAR’s Capek Lab featured presentations and demonstrations on swarm robots, vision, and ethics by Mohsen Raoufi, Nicolas Roth, and Nina Poth, while the large pub quiz at the TU tent, organized by all the Berlin clusters together, brought a large audience together as they competed for most knowledgeable team! Read more about it here.

• Nicolas Roth, “The wandering eye: An experiment on visual search”
• Mohsen Raoufi, “Meet the Swarm Robots”
• Nina Poth, “Rediscovering intelligence – learning, thinking and acting in mind and machine”
• “Meet Pepper”
• “Exzellentes Pub Quiz”

Futures of Air – Speculative Workshop Series

Three air-themed CollActive Materials Workshops is part of the BUA-funded project CollActive Materials, a joint science communication project of the two Clusters of Excellence Science of Intelligence and Matters of Activity. In this project, the two clusters draw from their respective thematic areas to imagine our possible futures with intelligent materials in a collective speculation that involves scientists, designers, and the general public. In three independent co-designed workshops, we explore the properties of air as a material, negotiate its role in our lives, and imagine our possible (and impossible) futures with it. More information here.

• Breathing in, Breathing out
• Von Kontrolle zu Kooperation
• Es liegt was in der Luft

Girls’ Day 2023

On Girls’ Day 2023 our members Maria Ott, Julten Abdelhalim, Vito Mengers & the RBO Team, Magdalena Yordanova, Nina Poth, and Lea Musiolek give inspiring talks on how researchers from different fields approach the topic of intelligence, followed by a visit of the labs. More info here.

Science of Intelligence Fair 2023

The first conference and exhibition of the Cluster of Excellence Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) in Berlinwas held in September 2023. Leading experts from science and politics, as well as journalists and the broader public came together to discuss the diverse facets of intelligence research. From individual, social, and collective principles of intelligence to the ethics of AI, the event offered a display of interdisciplinary collaboration and advancements from within the cluster, shedding light on the challenges of developing intelligent technologies. In guided tours through the accompanying exhibition that were held throughout the day, attendees got into exchange with the scientists and learned about the most recent research on intelligence straight from the labs. Read more about it here.

Berlin Science Week 2022

Three different events to explore play around the concept of intelligence, and its implications for scientific research. A joint Workshop Matters of Activity and Science of Intelligence on research bio-designs; a Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel on ethical questions on artificial Intelligence; a Science Cluster Slam full of exciting experimental setups with Benjamin Lang.

• The Science Slam of the Berlin Clusters of Excellence, “Clear the stage for science”
• Collective Materials Workshop, “What is the Future Made Of?”
• Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel, “Artificial Intelligence: Examples of AI gone wrong and Ethical Questions”

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: RBO event – Cool things robots do

In this event, The RBO Lab Team has given three exciting demonstrations of recent advances in robotics: acoustic sensing with soft robot fingers, robot hand teleoperation, and moving robotic hand perceiving spatial depths.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Joint “Meet the scientist” talk with all of Berlin’s seven clusters at Humboldt Labor exhibition: Die Soziale Intelligenz von Tieren

Many animals show amazing cognitive abilities. Using a robofish, David Bierbach has given a talk about some of the remarkable abilities that can be observed in schools of fishes, like anticipating future behavior, and collective synchronization.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Meet the Swarm Robots

In this demonstration Mohsen Raoufi has shown how a swarm of robots can solve problems, make accurate decisions, and perform tasks collectively using bio-inspired algorithms.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Exploiting Group Knowledge: collective learning behavior in a group of robots

In this demonstration Dustin Lehmann has shown visitors a group of balancing robots working together to learn difficult motions and moving together like a collective.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Saccades – the fastest human movement

To perceive the world around us, we constantly make rapid eye movements called saccades. In this experiment, Richard Schweitzer, Angelica Godinez, and Mara Doering have used high-speed recording and presentation devices to highlight the importance of people’s saccades and show their visual consequences.

SCIoI+MoA CollActive Materials Event, “Woraus ist deine Zukunft gemacht?”: IdeenLabor, Kombucha Workshop, and family activities!

What do sensitive robots, gripping plants and creative bacteria have in common? Let’s find out together! In the “CollActive Materials” experimental laboratory, a joint project of SCIoI and MoA, research and society come together to explore the materials of the future: Can they be more active or more intelligent than the materials of today? Come by to discover surprisingly living materials, and tell us your ideas and wishes for the future with Pia Bideau and Caroline Duncan.

Ralf Kurvers at “Meet the Scientist”, Humboldt Forum

For the series “Meet the Scientist” (5 May, 2022), SCIoI member Ralf Kurvers presented data collected in the Humboldt Lab over the last six months and gave insights into his findings and the fascinating field of collective psychology. Read more information here, or check out some impressions of the event here.

Girls’ Day 2022

On Girls’ Day 2022 (28 April 22), SCIoI members Jinan Allan and Marah Halawa give an overview of their life as women in science, including ambitions and possible challenges, and show their labs in the cluster.

Berlin Science Week 2021: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to explore the diversity of intelligent behaviors, from robotic cameras to swarm intelligence. Speakers: Guillermo Gallego, Alex Kacelnik, Marc Toussaint, Pawel Romanczuk, Ralph Kurvers, and Fritz Francisco.

• Guillermo Gallego: Giving Robots T-Rex-Inspired Eyes
• David Bierbach: Just be yourself! How individual differences shape collective behavior. Using a robotic fish to understand collective behavior
• Alex Kacelnik and Marc Toussaint: “Unsolved Problems in the Study of Intelligence. Learning about intelligence, from crows to robots”
• Ralf Kurvers and Pawel Romanczuk: Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? From Fish Schools to Human Groups. Exploring swarm intelligence in fish and humans
• Fritz Francisco: Why Behaviour? Why we behave the way we do

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2021:
The SCIoI Science Pub Quiz

A fun evening with Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) and Heidelberg’s Science Pub Quiz.

What is intelligence? Do beets float in water? Why should you pet your basil? SCIoI members Aravind Battaje and Lynn Schmittwilken, SCIoI researchers in the fields of neurosciences and robotics, spoke about their latest research and answered our most burning questions about brains and how computers can perceive the world.

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021:
ROBOFISH: Mit einem Fischroboter das Schwarmverhalten verstehen

For this year’s digital edition of the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaftem, David Bierbach prepared a demonstration explaining how Robofish, a robotic fish, can help us better understand group behavior in fish.

Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? Swarm intelligence in fish and humans

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021.

In this talk, Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers from our Excellence Cluster explored swarm intelligence in fish and humans, investigating the role of single individuals and social interactions in collective decisions, also exploring when collectives make good decisions, and when they go wrong.

Girls’ Day 2021

On Girls’ Day 2021 (April 22), SCIoI member Lynn Schmittwilken gave an inspiring talk about what it’s like to be a vision scientist, addressing 20 young girls from all around Germany. More information here.

Brain Awareness Week 2021

In March 2021, SCIoI participated in Brain Awareness Week with two events:
a lab demonstration on optical illusions, organized together with + the Active Perception and Cognition Lab (Martin Rolfs), and a talk about mindfulness for PhD students organized in collaboration with Scholar Minds and the Berlin School of Mind and Brain.

Nach der Natur: the new exhibition at the Humboldt Labor

The new Humboldt Labor exhibition in Berlin presents SCIoI together with all other Excellence Clusters in Berlin through a dynamic and fascinating exhibition encompassing the theme of swarm intelligence.

Berlin Science Week: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to discover intelligence seen from the different disciplines.

• Alex Kacelnik: Are we more like we think they are, or are they more like we think we are?
• Marc Toussaint: How AI makes us rethink our intelligence
• Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers: Collective intelligence or collective stupidity?
• Michael Pauen: Is artificial intelligence intelligent?
• Dimitri Coelho Mollo, Lynn Schmittwilken, Rainer Mühlhoff, Ingo Schulz-Schaeffer: Living with AI, past, present and future.

Present Futures Forum, SCIoI’s Fishbowl Discussion: “Predictive AI — Crystal ball to see the future or a threat to civil rights?”

Rainer Mühlhoff and John-Dylan Haynes participated in a fishbowl discussion on predictive AI on 23 June 2020.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2020

Event canceled due to Covid19.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2019

Robots playing soccer, lab mice, visual experiments: SCIoI members demonstrated their science and talk about their discoveries for an entire evening.

Girls’ Day 2024

On Girl’s Day 2024, our members Palina Bartashevich, Asieh Daneshi, Soledad Traverso, Anna Lange, and David Mezey, with the help of our lab managers Matthis Kaiser, Michael Brück, and Rolf Struikmans, have shown the girls around SCIoI, offering hands-on demonstrations on topics such as Virtual Reality, interacting with robots, fish swarms, and mouse lockboxes. The girls will also visit the laser cutter and get to build their own 3D puzzle robot.

Berlin Science Week 2023

SCIoI has participated at the Berlin Science Week (BSW) 2023, under the theme “Dare to Know” with two performances, and also won a prize. Read more about it here.

• David Bierbach, “From chaos to order: How large collectives benefit from being in a critical state between complete disorder and strong structure”
• Intercluster Science Slam

Airbound: Sensing Collective Futures

The exhibition »Airbound« features climate fictions and speculative everyday scenarios – developed in an open process by collaborators from society, science, and design. Through speculative installations, »Airbound« provides space to discuss urgent geopolitical issues. At stake are the contested knowledge of the climate, the destructive use of joint resources, and the injustices that are inherently connected. Air is critically bound to these – as collective, active, and intelligent material.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2023

This year, SCIoI had a long and exciting Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften. Our Open Lab event at MAR’s Capek Lab featured presentations and demonstrations on swarm robots, vision, and ethics by Mohsen Raoufi, Nicolas Roth, and Nina Poth, while the large pub quiz at the TU tent, organized by all the Berlin clusters together, brought a large audience together as they competed for most knowledgeable team! Read more about it here.

• Nicolas Roth, “The wandering eye: An experiment on visual search”
• Mohsen Raoufi, “Meet the Swarm Robots”
• Nina Poth, “Rediscovering intelligence – learning, thinking and acting in mind and machine”
• “Meet Pepper”
• “Exzellentes Pub Quiz”

Futures of Air – Speculative Workshop Series

Three air-themed CollActive Materials Workshops is part of the BUA-funded project CollActive Materials, a joint science communication project of the two Clusters of Excellence Science of Intelligence and Matters of Activity. In this project, the two clusters draw from their respective thematic areas to imagine our possible futures with intelligent materials in a collective speculation that involves scientists, designers, and the general public. In three independent co-designed workshops, we explore the properties of air as a material, negotiate its role in our lives, and imagine our possible (and impossible) futures with it. More information here.

• Breathing in, Breathing out
• Von Kontrolle zu Kooperation
• Es liegt was in der Luft

Girls’ Day 2023

On Girls’ Day 2023 our members Maria Ott, Julten Abdelhalim, Vito Mengers & the RBO Team, Magdalena Yordanova, Nina Poth, and Lea Musiolek give inspiring talks on how researchers from different fields approach the topic of intelligence, followed by a visit of the labs. More info here.

Science of Intelligence Fair 2023

The first conference and exhibition of the Cluster of Excellence Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) in Berlinwas held in September 2023. Leading experts from science and politics, as well as journalists and the broader public came together to discuss the diverse facets of intelligence research. From individual, social, and collective principles of intelligence to the ethics of AI, the event offered a display of interdisciplinary collaboration and advancements from within the cluster, shedding light on the challenges of developing intelligent technologies. In guided tours through the accompanying exhibition that were held throughout the day, attendees got into exchange with the scientists and learned about the most recent research on intelligence straight from the labs. Read more about it here.

Berlin Science Week 2022

Three different events to explore play around the concept of intelligence, and its implications for scientific research. A joint Workshop Matters of Activity and Science of Intelligence on research bio-designs; a Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel on ethical questions on artificial Intelligence; a Science Cluster Slam full of exciting experimental setups with Benjamin Lang.

• The Science Slam of the Berlin Clusters of Excellence, “Clear the stage for science”
• Collective Materials Workshop, “What is the Future Made Of?”
• Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel, “Artificial Intelligence: Examples of AI gone wrong and Ethical Questions”

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: RBO event – Cool things robots do

In this event, The RBO Lab Team has given three exciting demonstrations of recent advances in robotics: acoustic sensing with soft robot fingers, robot hand teleoperation, and moving robotic hand perceiving spatial depths.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Joint “Meet the scientist” talk with all of Berlin’s seven clusters at Humboldt Labor exhibition: Die Soziale Intelligenz von Tieren

Many animals show amazing cognitive abilities. Using a robofish, David Bierbach has given a talk about some of the remarkable abilities that can be observed in schools of fishes, like anticipating future behavior, and collective synchronization.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Meet the Swarm Robots

In this demonstration Mohsen Raoufi has shown how a swarm of robots can solve problems, make accurate decisions, and perform tasks collectively using bio-inspired algorithms.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Exploiting Group Knowledge: collective learning behavior in a group of robots

In this demonstration Dustin Lehmann has shown visitors a group of balancing robots working together to learn difficult motions and moving together like a collective.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Saccades – the fastest human movement

To perceive the world around us, we constantly make rapid eye movements called saccades. In this experiment, Richard Schweitzer, Angelica Godinez, and Mara Doering have used high-speed recording and presentation devices to highlight the importance of people’s saccades and show their visual consequences.

SCIoI+MoA CollActive Materials Event, “Woraus ist deine Zukunft gemacht?”: IdeenLabor, Kombucha Workshop, and family activities!

What do sensitive robots, gripping plants and creative bacteria have in common? Let’s find out together! In the “CollActive Materials” experimental laboratory, a joint project of SCIoI and MoA, research and society come together to explore the materials of the future: Can they be more active or more intelligent than the materials of today? Come by to discover surprisingly living materials, and tell us your ideas and wishes for the future with Pia Bideau and Caroline Duncan.

Ralf Kurvers at “Meet the Scientist”, Humboldt Forum

For the series “Meet the Scientist” (5 May, 2022), SCIoI member Ralf Kurvers presented data collected in the Humboldt Lab over the last six months and gave insights into his findings and the fascinating field of collective psychology. Read more information here, or check out some impressions of the event here.

Girls’ Day 2022

On Girls’ Day 2022 (28 April 22), SCIoI members Jinan Allan and Marah Halawa give an overview of their life as women in science, including ambitions and possible challenges, and show their labs in the cluster.

Berlin Science Week 2021: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to explore the diversity of intelligent behaviors, from robotic cameras to swarm intelligence. Speakers: Guillermo Gallego, Alex Kacelnik, Marc Toussaint, Pawel Romanczuk, Ralph Kurvers, and Fritz Francisco.

• Guillermo Gallego: Giving Robots T-Rex-Inspired Eyes
• David Bierbach: Just be yourself! How individual differences shape collective behavior. Using a robotic fish to understand collective behavior
• Alex Kacelnik and Marc Toussaint: “Unsolved Problems in the Study of Intelligence. Learning about intelligence, from crows to robots”
• Ralf Kurvers and Pawel Romanczuk: Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? From Fish Schools to Human Groups. Exploring swarm intelligence in fish and humans
• Fritz Francisco: Why Behaviour? Why we behave the way we do

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2021:
The SCIoI Science Pub Quiz

A fun evening with Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) and Heidelberg’s Science Pub Quiz.

What is intelligence? Do beets float in water? Why should you pet your basil? SCIoI members Aravind Battaje and Lynn Schmittwilken, SCIoI researchers in the fields of neurosciences and robotics, spoke about their latest research and answered our most burning questions about brains and how computers can perceive the world.

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021:
ROBOFISH: Mit einem Fischroboter das Schwarmverhalten verstehen

For this year’s digital edition of the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaftem, David Bierbach prepared a demonstration explaining how Robofish, a robotic fish, can help us better understand group behavior in fish.

Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? Swarm intelligence in fish and humans

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021.

In this talk, Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers from our Excellence Cluster explored swarm intelligence in fish and humans, investigating the role of single individuals and social interactions in collective decisions, also exploring when collectives make good decisions, and when they go wrong.

Girls’ Day 2021

On Girls’ Day 2021 (April 22), SCIoI member Lynn Schmittwilken gave an inspiring talk about what it’s like to be a vision scientist, addressing 20 young girls from all around Germany. More information here.

Brain Awareness Week 2021

In March 2021, SCIoI participated in Brain Awareness Week with two events:
a lab demonstration on optical illusions, organized together with + the Active Perception and Cognition Lab (Martin Rolfs), and a talk about mindfulness for PhD students organized in collaboration with Scholar Minds and the Berlin School of Mind and Brain.

Nach der Natur: the new exhibition at the Humboldt Labor

The new Humboldt Labor exhibition in Berlin presents SCIoI together with all other Excellence Clusters in Berlin through a dynamic and fascinating exhibition encompassing the theme of swarm intelligence.

Berlin Science Week: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to discover intelligence seen from the different disciplines.

• Alex Kacelnik: Are we more like we think they are, or are they more like we think we are?
• Marc Toussaint: How AI makes us rethink our intelligence
• Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers: Collective intelligence or collective stupidity?
• Michael Pauen: Is artificial intelligence intelligent?
• Dimitri Coelho Mollo, Lynn Schmittwilken, Rainer Mühlhoff, Ingo Schulz-Schaeffer: Living with AI, past, present and future.

Present Futures Forum, SCIoI’s Fishbowl Discussion: “Predictive AI — Crystal ball to see the future or a threat to civil rights?”

Rainer Mühlhoff and John-Dylan Haynes participated in a fishbowl discussion on predictive AI on 23 June 2020.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2020

Event canceled due to Covid19.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2019

Robots playing soccer, lab mice, visual experiments: SCIoI members demonstrated their science and talk about their discoveries for an entire evening.

Girls’ Day 2024

On Girl’s Day 2024, our members Palina Bartashevich, Asieh Daneshi, Soledad Traverso, Anna Lange, and David Mezey, with the help of our lab managers Matthis Kaiser, Michael Brück, and Rolf Struikmans, have shown the girls around SCIoI, offering hands-on demonstrations on topics such as Virtual Reality, interacting with robots, fish swarms, and mouse lockboxes. The girls will also visit the laser cutter and get to build their own 3D puzzle robot.

Berlin Science Week 2023

SCIoI has participated at the Berlin Science Week (BSW) 2023, under the theme “Dare to Know” with two performances, and also won a prize. Read more about it here.

• David Bierbach, “From chaos to order: How large collectives benefit from being in a critical state between complete disorder and strong structure”
• Intercluster Science Slam

Airbound: Sensing Collective Futures

The exhibition »Airbound« features climate fictions and speculative everyday scenarios – developed in an open process by collaborators from society, science, and design. Through speculative installations, »Airbound« provides space to discuss urgent geopolitical issues. At stake are the contested knowledge of the climate, the destructive use of joint resources, and the injustices that are inherently connected. Air is critically bound to these – as collective, active, and intelligent material.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2023

This year, SCIoI had a long and exciting Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften. Our Open Lab event at MAR’s Capek Lab featured presentations and demonstrations on swarm robots, vision, and ethics by Mohsen Raoufi, Nicolas Roth, and Nina Poth, while the large pub quiz at the TU tent, organized by all the Berlin clusters together, brought a large audience together as they competed for most knowledgeable team! Read more about it here.

• Nicolas Roth, “The wandering eye: An experiment on visual search”
• Mohsen Raoufi, “Meet the Swarm Robots”
• Nina Poth, “Rediscovering intelligence – learning, thinking and acting in mind and machine”
• “Meet Pepper”
• “Exzellentes Pub Quiz”

Futures of Air – Speculative Workshop Series

Three air-themed CollActive Materials Workshops is part of the BUA-funded project CollActive Materials, a joint science communication project of the two Clusters of Excellence Science of Intelligence and Matters of Activity. In this project, the two clusters draw from their respective thematic areas to imagine our possible futures with intelligent materials in a collective speculation that involves scientists, designers, and the general public. In three independent co-designed workshops, we explore the properties of air as a material, negotiate its role in our lives, and imagine our possible (and impossible) futures with it. More information here.

• Breathing in, Breathing out
• Von Kontrolle zu Kooperation
• Es liegt was in der Luft

Girls’ Day 2023

On Girls’ Day 2023 our members Maria Ott, Julten Abdelhalim, Vito Mengers & the RBO Team, Magdalena Yordanova, Nina Poth, and Lea Musiolek give inspiring talks on how researchers from different fields approach the topic of intelligence, followed by a visit of the labs. More info here.

Science of Intelligence Fair 2023

The first conference and exhibition of the Cluster of Excellence Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) in Berlinwas held in September 2023. Leading experts from science and politics, as well as journalists and the broader public came together to discuss the diverse facets of intelligence research. From individual, social, and collective principles of intelligence to the ethics of AI, the event offered a display of interdisciplinary collaboration and advancements from within the cluster, shedding light on the challenges of developing intelligent technologies. In guided tours through the accompanying exhibition that were held throughout the day, attendees got into exchange with the scientists and learned about the most recent research on intelligence straight from the labs. Read more about it here.

Berlin Science Week 2022

Three different events to explore play around the concept of intelligence, and its implications for scientific research. A joint Workshop Matters of Activity and Science of Intelligence on research bio-designs; a Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel on ethical questions on artificial Intelligence; a Science Cluster Slam full of exciting experimental setups with Benjamin Lang.

• The Science Slam of the Berlin Clusters of Excellence, “Clear the stage for science”
• Collective Materials Workshop, “What is the Future Made Of?”
• Panel Discussion with Dafna Burema, Mattis Jacobs, and Jonas Frenkel, “Artificial Intelligence: Examples of AI gone wrong and Ethical Questions”

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: RBO event – Cool things robots do

In this event, The RBO Lab Team has given three exciting demonstrations of recent advances in robotics: acoustic sensing with soft robot fingers, robot hand teleoperation, and moving robotic hand perceiving spatial depths.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Joint “Meet the scientist” talk with all of Berlin’s seven clusters at Humboldt Labor exhibition: Die Soziale Intelligenz von Tieren

Many animals show amazing cognitive abilities. Using a robofish, David Bierbach has given a talk about some of the remarkable abilities that can be observed in schools of fishes, like anticipating future behavior, and collective synchronization.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Meet the Swarm Robots

In this demonstration Mohsen Raoufi has shown how a swarm of robots can solve problems, make accurate decisions, and perform tasks collectively using bio-inspired algorithms.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Exploiting Group Knowledge: collective learning behavior in a group of robots

In this demonstration Dustin Lehmann has shown visitors a group of balancing robots working together to learn difficult motions and moving together like a collective.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2022: Saccades – the fastest human movement

To perceive the world around us, we constantly make rapid eye movements called saccades. In this experiment, Richard Schweitzer, Angelica Godinez, and Mara Doering have used high-speed recording and presentation devices to highlight the importance of people’s saccades and show their visual consequences.

SCIoI+MoA CollActive Materials Event, “Woraus ist deine Zukunft gemacht?”: IdeenLabor, Kombucha Workshop, and family activities!

What do sensitive robots, gripping plants and creative bacteria have in common? Let’s find out together! In the “CollActive Materials” experimental laboratory, a joint project of SCIoI and MoA, research and society come together to explore the materials of the future: Can they be more active or more intelligent than the materials of today? Come by to discover surprisingly living materials, and tell us your ideas and wishes for the future with Pia Bideau and Caroline Duncan.

Ralf Kurvers at “Meet the Scientist”, Humboldt Forum

For the series “Meet the Scientist” (5 May, 2022), SCIoI member Ralf Kurvers presented data collected in the Humboldt Lab over the last six months and gave insights into his findings and the fascinating field of collective psychology. Read more information here, or check out some impressions of the event here.

Girls’ Day 2022

On Girls’ Day 2022 (28 April 22), SCIoI members Jinan Allan and Marah Halawa give an overview of their life as women in science, including ambitions and possible challenges, and show their labs in the cluster.

Berlin Science Week 2021: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to explore the diversity of intelligent behaviors, from robotic cameras to swarm intelligence. Speakers: Guillermo Gallego, Alex Kacelnik, Marc Toussaint, Pawel Romanczuk, Ralph Kurvers, and Fritz Francisco.

• Guillermo Gallego: Giving Robots T-Rex-Inspired Eyes
• David Bierbach: Just be yourself! How individual differences shape collective behavior. Using a robotic fish to understand collective behavior
• Alex Kacelnik and Marc Toussaint: “Unsolved Problems in the Study of Intelligence. Learning about intelligence, from crows to robots”
• Ralf Kurvers and Pawel Romanczuk: Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? From Fish Schools to Human Groups. Exploring swarm intelligence in fish and humans
• Fritz Francisco: Why Behaviour? Why we behave the way we do

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2021:
The SCIoI Science Pub Quiz

A fun evening with Science of Intelligence (SCIoI) and Heidelberg’s Science Pub Quiz.

What is intelligence? Do beets float in water? Why should you pet your basil? SCIoI members Aravind Battaje and Lynn Schmittwilken, SCIoI researchers in the fields of neurosciences and robotics, spoke about their latest research and answered our most burning questions about brains and how computers can perceive the world.

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021:
ROBOFISH: Mit einem Fischroboter das Schwarmverhalten verstehen

For this year’s digital edition of the Lange Nacht der Wissenschaftem, David Bierbach prepared a demonstration explaining how Robofish, a robotic fish, can help us better understand group behavior in fish.

Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity? Swarm intelligence in fish and humans

Lange Nacht der Wisssenschaften 2021.

In this talk, Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers from our Excellence Cluster explored swarm intelligence in fish and humans, investigating the role of single individuals and social interactions in collective decisions, also exploring when collectives make good decisions, and when they go wrong.

Girls’ Day 2021

On Girls’ Day 2021 (April 22), SCIoI member Lynn Schmittwilken gave an inspiring talk about what it’s like to be a vision scientist, addressing 20 young girls from all around Germany. More information here.

Brain Awareness Week 2021

In March 2021, SCIoI participated in Brain Awareness Week with two events:
a lab demonstration on optical illusions, organized together with + the Active Perception and Cognition Lab (Martin Rolfs), and a talk about mindfulness for PhD students organized in collaboration with Scholar Minds and the Berlin School of Mind and Brain.

Nach der Natur: the new exhibition at the Humboldt Labor

The new Humboldt Labor exhibition in Berlin presents SCIoI together with all other Excellence Clusters in Berlin through a dynamic and fascinating exhibition encompassing the theme of swarm intelligence.

Berlin Science Week: “6 o’clock with SCIoI”

Five evening talks to discover intelligence seen from the different disciplines.

• Alex Kacelnik: Are we more like we think they are, or are they more like we think we are?
• Marc Toussaint: How AI makes us rethink our intelligence
• Pawel Romanczuk and Ralf Kurvers: Collective intelligence or collective stupidity?
• Michael Pauen: Is artificial intelligence intelligent?
• Dimitri Coelho Mollo, Lynn Schmittwilken, Rainer Mühlhoff, Ingo Schulz-Schaeffer: Living with AI, past, present and future.

Present Futures Forum, SCIoI’s Fishbowl Discussion: “Predictive AI — Crystal ball to see the future or a threat to civil rights?”

Rainer Mühlhoff and John-Dylan Haynes participated in a fishbowl discussion on predictive AI on 23 June 2020.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2020

Event canceled due to Covid19.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2019

Robots playing soccer, lab mice, visual experiments: SCIoI members demonstrated their science and talk about their discoveries for an entire evening.

Girls’ Day 2024

On Girl’s Day 2024, our members Palina Bartashevich, Asieh Daneshi, Soledad Traverso, Anna Lange, and David Mezey, with the help of our lab managers Matthis Kaiser, Michael Brück, and Rolf Struikmans, have shown the girls around SCIoI, offering hands-on demonstrations on topics such as Virtual Reality, interacting with robots, fish swarms, and mouse lockboxes. The girls will also visit the laser cutter and get to build their own 3D puzzle robot.

Berlin Science Week 2023

SCIoI has participated at the Berlin Science Week (BSW) 2023, under the theme “Dare to Know” with two performances, and also won a prize. Read more about it here.

• David Bierbach, “From chaos to order: How large collectives benefit from being in a critical state between complete disorder and strong structure”
• Intercluster Science Slam

Airbound: Sensing Collective Futures

The exhibition »Airbound« features climate fictions and speculative everyday scenarios – developed in an open process by collaborators from society, science, and design. Through speculative installations, »Airbound« provides space to discuss urgent geopolitical issues. At stake are the contested knowledge of the climate, the destructive use of joint resources, and the injustices that are inherently connected. Air is critically bound to these – as collective, active, and intelligent material.

Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften 2023

This year, SCIoI had a long and exciting Lange Nacht der Wissenschaften. Our Open Lab event at MAR’s Capek Lab featured presentations and demonstrations on swarm robots, vision, and ethics by Mohsen Raoufi, Nicolas Roth, and Nina Poth, while the large pub quiz at the TU tent, organized by all the Berlin clusters together, brought a large audience together as they competed for most knowledgeable team! Read more about it here.

• Nicolas Roth, “The wandering eye: An experiment on visual search”
• Mohsen Raoufi, “Meet the Swarm Robots”
• Nina Poth, “Rediscovering intelligence – learning, thinking and acting in mind and machine”
• “Meet Pepper”
• “Exzellentes Pub Quiz”

Futures of Air – Speculative Workshop Series

Three air-themed CollActive Materials Workshops is part of the BUA-funded project CollActive Materials, a joint science communication project of the two Clusters of Excellence Science of Intelligence and Matters of Activity. In this project, the two clusters draw from their respective thematic areas to imagine our possible futures with intelligent materials in a collective speculation that involves scientists, designers, and the general public. In three independent co-designed workshops, we explore the properties of air as a material, negotiate its role in our lives, and imagine our possible (and impossible) futures with it. More information here.

• Breathing in, Breathing out
• Von Kontrolle zu Kooperation
• Es liegt was in der Luft