Join our fifth edition of a yearly meeting of research IT specialists, organized by the EnhanceR association!
Event Format
An in-person event for members of the Swiss research IT and research software engineer community, this symposium provides a platform for professionals to meet, network, and exchange knowledge.
Dive deep into the trends of the field, collaborate on shared challenges, and present your innovative projects in engaging show-and-tell sessions.
Take the opportunity to share both success and failure stories, learn from your colleagues, and collaborate on advancement of responsible AI use in Swiss academia.
Focus Areas
-
AI in Scientific Coding Workflows
- AI for Scientific Software & Workflows (coding assistants, agentic tools, automation)
- Responsible & Secure AI Use (privacy, sensitive data, trusted environments, ethics, model choice: local vs frontier)
- Quality, Reproducibility & Maintainability (testing, documentation, long-term sustainability of AI-assisted code)
- AI in Teaching & Skills Development (teaching with AI, learning outcomes, good practices for researchers)
- Compute Trends Beyond AI (emerging architectures and future computing models)
- Research Data & Workflow Foundations (scientific workflows, research data management, integration into research practice)
Date and Venue
EnhanceR Symposium is a full day, in-person event on Nov 30th, 2026. The event will hosted at the Paul Scherrer Institute.
Address:
PSI Villigen, Auditorium (WHGA/001)
Forschungsstrasse 111
5232 Villigen
How to participate
The registration for the event is now open! See details at the registration page.
The event is open to all research IT specialists and research software engineers in Switzerland, whether your organization is part of the EnhanceR network or not. Participation is free of charge, but registration is mandatory. Lunch and coffee breaks for participants are sponsored by EnhanceR.
You can also add the event to your calendar.
Target audience
The event's goal is to connect research IT specialists: experts who empower research by providing specific, advanced IT services.
Examples include research software engineers, high-performance and scientific computing experts, data and information scientists, as well as research data management experts, data stewards and data analysis specialists in Swiss higher education institutions, Swiss research institutions and private companies that have a focus on serving public academic institutions (e.g. SWITCH).
Keynote speakers
Mathieu Acher is Full Professor of Computer Science at INSA Rennes, a junior research fellow at the Institut Universitaire de France (IUF), and a researcher in the DiverSE team at Inria, IRISA, and CNRS. His research focuses on software engineering for configurable and software-intensive systems, combining software engineering with artificial intelligence techniques, including machine learning and generative AI. He is internationally recognized for his work on software variability, software product lines, reverse engineering, and reproducible computational science. Professor Acher has authored more than 150 peer-reviewed publications and has received numerous Best Paper Awards and a Most Influential Paper Award. He has also played a leading role in the software engineering community, serving as program co-chair of major conferences such as SPLC and VaMoS and contributing to the advancement of reproducible, AI-assisted software engineering research. He's currently co-leading Défi Inria LLM4Code.
April Yi Wang is a Professor of Educational Technology in the Department of Computer Science at ETH Zurich and an affiliated faculty member of the ETH AI Center. Her research lies at the intersection of human-computer interaction (HCI), educational technology, and human-AI collaboration, with a focus on designing intelligent, human-centred programming environments that make coding more effective, accessible, and collaborative. Before joining ETH Zurich in 2023, she earned her PhD in Information Science from the University of Michigan, following degrees from Simon Fraser University and Zhejiang University. Her work has received numerous distinctions, including ACM CSCW Best Paper and ACM CHI Honourable Mention awards. Professor Wang's research explores how AI can transform programming education and professional software development while keeping human needs, usability, and learning at the centre of technological innovation.
Cornelius Hempel is Group Head of Ion Trap Quantum Computing and Deputy Head of Quantum at the Laboratory for Nano and Quantum Technologies (LNQ) at the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI), where he also leads the ETH Zurich–PSI Quantum Computing Hub. His research focuses on building scalable trapped-ion quantum computers and advancing quantum technologies from laboratory demonstrations towards practical research infrastructure. Over nearly two decades in quantum computing, he has contributed to several landmark achievements, including the first universal digital quantum simulation, the first fully controllable 20-qubit trapped-ion system, pioneering work on the Variational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE), and advances in quantum error correction and analog quantum simulation. Before joining PSI in 2021, he held research positions at the University of Innsbruck, IQOQI, and the University of Sydney.
Organizers
The EnhanceR association is a nationally and internationally recognized network for Swiss research IT expertise. As of 2026, it counts 11 Swiss higher education, infrastructure and research institutions as members. Its motto is "Enhancing research through IT expertise."
The mission of EnhanceR is to facilitate research excellence in Switzerland by bringing together Research IT specialist groups from Swiss academic institutions and by organising events such as the annual symposium or virtual seminars. The association also aims to support and cooperate with other communities involved in supporting Swiss research through technical skills and knowledge, such as Research Software Engineers (RSE) or Data Stewards.
For questions regarding EnhanceR or the event, reach out to us at symposium@enhancer.ch
Previous Events
Looking for previous EnhanceR Symposium materials? Visit the 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025 edition website.