The eScience Institute is excited to launch an open and ongoing call for Special Interest Groups (SIGs). eScience SIGs are flexible and dynamic structures that support the development of new connections and communities on diverse data science related topics. Learn more about proposing a new SIG.
Satellite Image Analysis
Group Chairs: Valentina Staneva & Amanda Tan
This special interest group utilizes satellite imagery data sets provided by both federal institutions and private companies to answer questions in a variety of domains.
Computational Demography Working Group (CDWG)
Group Chairs: Connor Gilroy, Neal Marquez, Lee Fiorio, Tim Thomas, Sara Curran, Matt Dunbar & Jon Wakefield
The CDWG discuss topics related to: demographic data and computational and statistical methods, share students & faculty tools, develop via demos or tutorials, and graduate student & faculty research workshops. This group is hosted jointly with the UW Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology.
Remote Hackweeks
Group Chairs: Anthony Arendt, Daniela Huppenkothen & Charley Haley
The Remote Hackweeks Working Group shares lessons learned as we transition community building and educational activities to a remote environment. Together we are developing resources to support our collective efforts to build inclusive and welcoming communities using remote technologies.
Environmental Impacts of Data Science
Group Chairs: Dave Beck & Emily Keller
The computational activities of data science draw on cyberinfrastructure systems that are built, powered, and maintained using renewable and carbon-based energy sources and other natural resources. The externalized impacts that result are influenced by many factors, from data center design to AI modeling trends and cloud data storage policies. This interdisciplinary group explores ways to incorporate sustainability principles into data, computer and information sciences, for practitioners and educators.
Legacy Groups
Data Science Education and Career Paths
Group Chairs: Tyler McCormick and Sarah Stone
This group develops innovative teaching methods and formats to make both formal and informal training in data science skills more accessible within and beyond the UW. We also focus on how to create and sustain long-term career trajectories for a new generation of researchers whose work depends crucially on the analysis of massive, noisy, and/or complex data.
Data Science Studies
Group Chairs: Anissa Tanweer & Cecilia Aragon
UW Data Science Studies was a group of cross-disciplinary researchers interested in the sociocultural and organizational dimensions of data science. It existed to create opportunities for discussing research, reading scholarly work related to this subfield, supporting research collaborations, and leveraging sociotechnical perspectives to inform data science practice. The group convened from 2015 – 2021, and materials from their activities, including slides and video recordings, can be accessed through the archived website below.
Neuroinformatics
Group Chair: Ariel Rokem
The neuroinformatics special interest group at the University of Washington (UW) eScience Institute and the University of Washington Institute for Neuroengineering (UWIN) focuses on neuroinformatics methods and their role in understanding the brain.
Graphs and Networks – Theory and Applications
Group Chairs: Alice Schwarze & Spencer Wood
Thinking about data and complex systems as networks and using tools of network analysis has been a successful approach in various research problems. Many fields that have benefited from network approaches — e.g., systems biology, neuroscience, biomedicine, engineering sciences, and social sciences — have very active research communities at UW. Our SIG aims to create opportunities and spaces for researchers at UW and their colleagues to meet, learn, and discuss the connections between their research and network science.
