27th International Conference on Discovery Science (DS2024)
October 14-16, 2024, Pisa, Italy
http://ds2024.isti.cnr.it/index.html

***CALL FOR PAPER: MAIN RESEARCH TRACK***
Discovery Science 2024 conference provides an open forum for intensive discussions and exchange of new ideas among researchers working in the area of Discovery Science. The conference focus is on the use of Artificial Intelligence, Data Science and Big Data Analytics methods in science. Its scope includes the development and analysis of methods for discovering scientific knowledge, coming from machine learning, data mining, intelligent data analysis, and big data analytics, as well as their application in various domains. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

- Artificial Intelligence (machine learning, knowledge representation and reasoning, natural language processing, statistical methods, etc.) applied to science
- Machine Learning: supervised learning (including ranking, multi-target prediction and structured prediction), unsupervised learning, semi-supervised learning, active learning, reinforcement learning, online learning, transfer learning, etc.
- Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining
- Anomaly and Outlier Detection
- Time-Series Analysis
- Spatial, Temporal and Spatiotemporal Data Analysis
- Unstructured Data Analysis (textual and web data)
- Data and Knowledge Visualization
- Complex Network Analysis
- Causal Modelling
- Explainable AI and Interpretable Machine Learning
- Human-Machine Interaction for Knowledge Discovery and Management
- Data Streams, Evolving Data, Change Detection & Concept drift
- AutoML, Meta-Learning, Planning to Learn
- AI and High-performance Computing, Grid and Cloud Computing
- AI and Cybersecurity
- Computational Creativity
- Learning from Complex Data
- Process Discovery and Analysis
- Evaluation of Models and Predictions in Discovery Setting
- Applications of the above techniques in scientific domains, such as Physical sciences (e.g., materials sciences, particle physics), Life sciences (e.g., systems biology/systems medicine), Environmental sciences, Natural and social sciences

***IMPORTANT DATES***
Abstract submission (deadline): Monday June 3, 2024
Full paper submission (deadline): Monday June 10, 2024
Notification of acceptance: Monday July 22, 2024
Camera-ready version, author registration: Monday August 5, 2024
All dates are specified as 23:59:59 SST (Standard Samoa Time / Anywhere on Earth)

***SUBMISSION PROCEDURE***
Contributions, written in English, must be formatted according to the guidelines of the Lecture Notes of Computer Science (LNCS) series by Springer-Verlag, which are available together with templates here: https://www.springer.com/gp/computer-science/lncs/conference-proceedings-guidelines.
We strongly recommend using the LNCS template for LaTeX. The page limit for any contribution, including figures, title pages, references, and appendices, is 15 pages in the LNCS format. Submission of the camera-ready version of the paper has to include the authors’ consent to publish on the above Springer LNCS website. Submissions will be reviewed following a single-blind procedure. Therefore, authors should include their names and affiliations in the paper.

Authors may not submit any paper which is under review elsewhere or which has been accepted for publication in a journal or another conference; neither will they submit their papers elsewhere during the review period of DS’ 2024.

Submission System: https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/DS2024/

At least one of the authors must be a registered participant at the conference to present the work.


***SPECIAL ISSUE***
The authors of a number of selected papers presented at DS 2024 will be invited to submit extended versions of their papers for possible inclusion in a special issue of Machine Learning journal (published by Springer) on Discovery Science. Fast-track processing will be used to have them reviewed and published.

***BEST PAPER AWARD***
There will be a Best Student Paper Award in the value of 550 Eur sponsored by Springer, and a Best Paper Award in the value of 550 Eur sponsored by Fondazione Area.

***CALL FOR PAPER: SPECIAL TRACK SOBIGDATA***
SoBigData RI (www.sobigdata.eu) is a distributed, Pan-European, multi-disciplinary research infrastructure aimed at using social mining and big data to understand the complexity of our contemporary, globally-interconnected society. This year, Discovery Science and SoBigData RI, collaborate in order to have a special track. The topics are the same of the main track but focussed on experiments for the SoBigData research spaces:
- Demography, Economy and Finance 2.0: traditional complex socio-economic financial systems in conjunction with emerging ones, in particular, block-chain & cryptocurrency markets and their applications such as smart property, Internet of things, energy trading, and smart contracts.
- Disaster Response and Recovery: methods and tools to analyze, monitor, and improve post-disaster reconstruction processes in socio-economic areas, spatial planning, environmental health in cooperation with national and international institutions.
- Health Studies: experiments addressing health-related issues, including medical, nutrition, environmental health and network medicine. It entails integrating multidisciplinary scientific research including machine learning techniques and AI technologies.
- Pervasive Intelligence in Cyber-Physical Systems for Future Society: experiments on AI models for a dynamic and automatic allocation of resources capable of reacting to changes in services, application requirements, sustainability, and user-generated traffic. Specific attention will also be given to approaches based on the emulation of biological brain mechanisms, called Cyber-Physical systems, with the aim of creating a “conscious system” able to self-control a large number of subsystems.
- Societal Debates and Misinformation: experiments analyzing both discussions on social media and journalistic production to understand which are the most debated topics.
- Next-Generation Internet: experiments investigating the effect of Next Generation Internet paradigms by developing user- and device-centric services for groups of mobile users based on direct communication between faredge devices, validating them in the same application areas.
- Sustainable Cities for Citizens: experiments about the usage of mobile devices data, georeferenced social media data, or other spatio-temporal data to model human behavior and activities.
- Submitted paper must refer to a specific research space. Submitted papers must contain all the references to data and methods used in order to be accessible to the SoBigData community and to be published on the platform catalog (only in case of acceptance).

Accepted papers will be published in DS2024 proceedings and disseminated through the research infrastructure channels.

***INVITED SPEAKERS***
Roberto Navigli, Sapienza University of Rome and Babelscape — October 14th
Carlos Castillo, ICREA and Universitat Pompeu Fabra — October 15th
Francesca Toni, Imperial College London — October 16th


***IMPORTANT DATES***
Abstract submission (deadline): Monday, June 10, 2024
Full paper submission (deadline): Monday, June 17, 2024
Notification of acceptance: Monday, July 29, 2024
Camera-ready version, author registration: Monday August 5, 2024
All dates are specified as 23:59:59 SST (Standard Samoa Time / Anywhere on Earth)

***BEST PAPER AWARD***
There will be a Best SoBigData Paper award in the value of 550 Eur sponsored by SoBigData.


***CALL FOR LATE BREAKING CONTRIBUTIONS ***
The Posters Track complements the research track of the conference and offers an opportunity to present late-breaking results and showcase innovative implementations in an informal and interactive setting. During the Poster session authors are encouraged to directly connect with conference participants and engage in discussions about their work.
We invite submissions relevant to Discovery Science and which address, but are not limited to, the topics of the Research Track. We also welcome work that has already been seen in other places but needs to be shared with the Discovery Science community.
Authors of the research papers not accepted for the Research track can be invited to present their work via a poster in the Poster session to discuss their research and scientific contributions with the community and expand their network with other researchers.

***IMPORTANT DATES***
Submission due: Monday June 22, 2024
Notification of acceptance: Monday July 27, 2024
Camera-ready version (extended abstract), author registration: Monday August 5, 2024
All dates are specified as 23:59:59 SST (Standard Samoa Time / Anywhere on Earth)

***SUBMISSION DETAILS***
Authors should submit an up-to two-page (excluding references) extended abstract for evaluation. All submissions must be written in English, using the PDF file format, following the formatting guidelines of the research track, and submitted electronically via the CMT submission system: https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/DS2024/

Poster submissions should describe late-breaking research results, on-going research projects, or work-in-progress relevant to Discovery Science. Additional links to relevant resources are encouraged to be included in the submission.

The submissions should not be anonymised. Each submission will be reviewed by 2 members of the Program Committee.

All accepted posters will be available on the conference website. Authors are encouraged to link in the poster complementary materials (e.g. images, videos, code).

At least one of the authors must be a registered participant at the conference, and attend the Poster Session to present the work.

All papers accepted at the poster session will be published as extended abstracts (up to 4 pages in LNCS format) in CEUR proceedings.


***CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS: DOCTORAL CONSORTIUM***
The Doctoral Consortium (DC) provides an opportunity to present and discuss their doctoral research ideas and progress in a supportive, formative and yet critical environment and receive feedback from reviewers, mentors and peers from the field of Discovery Science. The DC will also provide opportunities to network and build collaborations with other members of the Discovery Science community. We welcome submissions across research Discovery Science-related domains and which address, but are not limited to, the topics of the Research Track.

The event is intended for early as well as middle/late-stage PhD candidates and asks them to formulate and submit a concrete PhD research proposal, preferably supported by some preliminary results. The proposal will be peer-reviewed. If accepted, students must register and physically attend the event to present their PhD research proposal in a Poster session. Details for the submission are found below under “Submission Details”.

***IMPORTANT DATES***
Submission due: Monday June 22, 2024
Notification of acceptance: Monday July 27, 2024
Camera-ready version (extended abstract), author registration: Monday August 5, 2024
All dates are specified as 23:59:59 SST (Standard Samoa Time / Anywhere on Earth)

***SUBMISSION DETAILS***
Authors should submit an up-to four-page (excluding references) description of their PhD research proposal. All submissions must be written in English, using the PDF file format, following the formatting guidelines of the research track, and submitted electronically via the CMT submission system: https://cmt3.research.microsoft.com/DS2024/
The papers should have a single author (the PhD candidate) and submissions are *not* anonymous. Supervisors, other involved persons, and funding agencies should be acknowledged in an Acknowledgements section.

Research proposals (and if accepted, the Posters) should contain the following elements:
- Context: The background and motivation for your research, including the related work that frames your research
- Research questions/challenges: what are the research questions/challenges that your dissertation addresses? Try to highlight how it differs from existing literature.
- Method/approach and evaluation: how is each of the research questions answered? How are results evaluated? If you are planning to conduct studies or build prototypes, provide a brief description.
- Preliminary results (if available). Highlight results and contribution to date and the timeplan for projected steps.
- Discussion and Future work: What are intermediary conclusions, and what are the planned next steps?

All accepted research proposals will be presented in a Poster session. Posters and PDF documents will be available on the conference website. PhD students are encouraged to link in the poster complementary materials (e.g. images, videos, code).

At least one of the authors must be a registered participant at the conference, and attend the Poster Session to present the work.

All papers accepted at the poster session will be published as extended abstracts (up to 4 pages in LNCS format) in CEUR proceedings.



***COMMITTEES AND CHAIRS***

GENERAL & PROGRAM CHAIRS
- Dino Pedreschi, University of Pisa
- Anna Monreale, University of Pisa
- Riccardo Guidotti, University of Pisa

STEERING COMMITTEE
- Michelangelo Ceci, University of Bari

SPECIAL SESSION CHAIR
- Roberto Trasarti, ISTI-CNR Pisa

POSTER SESSION CHAIR
- Francesca Naretto

DOCTORAL CONSORTIUM CHAIRS
- Fosca Giannotti
- Roberto Pellungrini

SOCIAL MEDIA & PUBLICITY CHAIR
- Vittorio Romano

LOCAL ORGANIZATION COMMITTEE
- Francesco Spinnato, University of Pisa