Participant Testimonials

Feb 05 - Feb 10, 2012

This was a very productive workshop for me, leading to new results, a new collaboration that I expect will lead to a paper, and learning about a result very closely related to something I had recently done with a lot of potential for cross-pollination.

James Aspnes Professor of Computer Science
Department of Computer Science, Yale University

Being at BIRS was a wonderful experience: The wonderful surroundings, the convenient facilities, and the warm hospitality of the staff has made the stay very comfortable. (Similar thanks go to the Banff centre staff, in the recreation facilities and the dining room.) For me it was first and foremost an opportunity to catch up on interesting research in my area. But it was also an opportunity to create new research: With 11 of my collaborators attending the workshop, I could make progress on several papers that I am writing (in one case, a presentation of the work by one of my coauthors has helped to find new applications). I also had a chance to describe some fresh results to relevant researchers and get their feedback. Finally, I got started on one or two new research directions.

Hagit Attiya The Technion

I formed new collaborations during the workshop and started working on two new projects with researchers I met there. In addition, I gained new insights about several topics that were discussed, which will definitely impact my research.

Keren Censor-Hillel CSAIL, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

This was an extremely productive workshop for me, maybe more so than almost any other workshop I've been involved in. The workshop was not quite in my area, though I have expertise in general randomized techniques. I was able to get feedback and encouragement from experts on shared memory computation on some half-baked ideas that I came with. An expert in this area whom I had never really talked to joined me and a couple of others in a collaboration which extended one of those ideas and will likely lead to a publication. On another idea, I received encouragement to publish and names of people to contact who might know more about the problem. Finally, working there with someone I often collaborate with, we came up with ideas which I think can be used to solve a major open problem.

Valerie King Professor
Department of Computer Science, University of Victoria