News Archive

Capturing hand and finger movements within milliseconds is becoming increasingly important for many applications, from virtual reality to human-machine interaction and Industry 4.0. So far, it has required enormous technical effort, which in turn has limited the possible applications. Computer scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Informatics have now developed a software system that requires only the built-in camera of a laptop, due to the interaction of various neural networks. For the first [...]

Digital data is considered the “new oil” in business and industry as it promises the same profits as the oil business. An entire industry is already based on “data science” and computational methods that promise even better analysis to outperform competitors and to find future business opportunities. So that the “new oil” does not turn out to be a false promise for customers, four renowned computer science experts of Saarland University are now founding the consulting [...]

One third of Germans are wearing a fitness tracker on their arm, according to a survey by the industry association Bitkom. The Saarbrücken start-up “InFit” goes even further. By analyzing novel biomarkers in collaboration with researchers from the Center for Bioinformatics at Saarland University, they provide a molecular fitness test that only top athletes have enjoyed so far. The corresponding app not only shows the molecular results, but also suggests training plans. 1000 samples from [...]

With its almost infinite depth of field, so-called light field photography has been fascinating amateur photographers since commercial cameras have been on the market. It offers the possibility to change the focus range of the selected image section after it is taken, and to produce three-dimensional images. For video, light field photography is used only sporadically so far, in part because the necessary camera systems exist only at a handful of institutions. For a few days, Saarland University [...]

More than 725,000 German children started school in the past year. It is already obvious that they will need computer science skills to prevail in the professional world and in everyday life later on. Experts are therefore calling for children to be introduced to algorithms and programming languages early on. The available tools are usually rather expensive, however, and do not necessarily satisfy the children’s play instincts. The start-up Fold-IO uses a combination of inexpensive craft paper [...]