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Finding and measuring 21st-century skills

Companies want employees who can think critically, work collaboratively and communicate through new technology. A revolutionary project is teaching... More

Fighting cyber threats you can’t see coming

Berlin’s Trifense, an EIT Entrepreneurship Award winner, takes a new approach to Internet security – and starts to gain traction in the... More

What economic downturn? European tech start-ups flourish in the storm

Victor Henning, co-founder of Mendeley, an online service that helps academic researchers organise and share the mounds of documents they collect,... More

Creating an entrepreneurial environment

Social stability, economic prosperity, and cultural richness all depend on educational excellence. Over the past thousand years, European universities... More

Education reform means a break from the past

Why the industrial model – hierarchical organizations using standardised methods to produce uniform products – no longer works for schools... More

The end of the remote control

Somewhere in the world, this scene is taking place. The lights are low in the living room, and a couple wants to switch from a video game to a movie. More

The classroom of the future is here

Innovative teachers + technology + smart policies = the active learning and collaborative skills required for the 21st century. More

Doctors on a call

A start-up created by two British medics combines social networks and cloud computing to make hospital staffing more efficient. More

European Institute of Innovation & Technology, a decent job, but…

Looking back at his three-year term as chairman of the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT), Martin Schuurmans has mixed feelings. More

Remaking Europe’s schools

In terms of modernising educational systems, Commissioner Vassiliou says, “We have a long way to go”. More

Getting the mice out of the operating theatres

If doctors could use natural user interfaces, like gestures, surgery could be quicker and safer. More

Swiss innovation on a roll

In just 15 years, Switzerland’s government and universities have worked to make the country a leader in entrepreneurship. It may be known for... More

Beyond the social network revolution

Microsoft is taking Facebook to the office and tailoring your Twitter feed. More

Why teens really do need social network sites

Teenagers use Facebook, MySpace and Twitter to form their social identities – in a world that may or may not include their parents. More

Digital heirlooms, your lifetime on a chip

When Richard Banks’ grandfather died about five years ago, he left behind a suitcase filled with hundreds of photographs, many depicting his... More

The smart way to roll out smart grids

Governments around the world are racing to invest in smart electricity grids to reduce energy consumption and battle climate change. The European... More

Bing Twitter Maps links tweeters to their location

How often has a friend tweeted you from a restaurant? Weren’t you curious to know where exactly it was? Since late 2009, Twitter users have been... More

It’s getting personal: computerised health records come of age

“Every human being is author of his own health or disease,” the Buddha said. Some 2,500 years later, technology is allowing patients to... More

Finland’s model for an innovation university

Finland has set out to create a university that has innovation built into its foundations, merging three institutions into one along the way. Is... More

Smart collaboration cuts energy consumption

Electricity companies around the world are racing to develop equipment to help homes and apartments automatically slash energy use. These “smart... More

Information technology skills boost innovation

Are our schools and universities teaching the right skills to enable a new generation of IT practitioners to drive forward innovation? The... More

Back to the boot camp: Fitness training for new enterprises

Belgian IT engineer Didier Beka had a new idea: software that would enable people with hearing or speaking disabilities to communicate by telephone.... More

Microsoft plays host to French robotics revolutionary

For French robotics pioneer Jean-Christophe Baillie, an entrepreneurial adventure that began in Paris five years ago led to a visit to... More

Gaming’s serious side: Helping brain-damaged patients

Fishing Cactus is a start-up that began in the world of entertainment games. Now it’s moving into what are called “serious games”... More

An Innovation Union for SMEs

Small and medium-sized enterprises – SMEs – will be the powerhouse of the Innovation Union that the EU must become if we are to enjoy... More

The cluster recipe: how to emulate Europe's most famous innovation hotspot

Billy Boyle is the kind of entrepreneur European policy makers would love to clone. Working out of a basement lab at Cambridge University, Boyle and... More

Kinect: The touch-free revolution in gaming

Today’s computer games depend on hand-held controllers that respond to physical touch. Kinect does away with any physical connection to the... More

EU Research Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn, warns against cuts in national R&D budgets in the downturn

European governments that cut spending on research and innovation to help rein in budget deficits risk sacrificing the EU’s future prosperity,... More

Centres for innovation

Microsoft Innovation Centres around Europe aim to help harness great ideas and turn them into successful businesses while creating jobs, helping... More

Going for Go

Go is a game so complex that raw computing power was never going to be enough to turn it into a competitive computer game. But two Cambridge... More

Health for all, care for you: The promise of personalised healthcare in Europe

Personalised healthcare stands at the confluence of the most powerful technologies in the history of the life sciences. More

Barcelona, eScience and cloud computing

The Barcelona Supercomputing Centre (BSC) is taking part in a pioneering EU Framework Programme 7 project on cloud computing , Venus-C - a... More

Microsoft's Barcelona Research Center

The Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) and Microsoft joined forces in 2008 to create the BSC-Microsoft Research Centre. More

European Union project to help scientific progress

Sahara dust forecasting, cancer genome sequencing or the design of computer’s next generation of microprocessors are among the scientific... More

Máire Geoghegan-Quinn - new EU Commissioner for Science & Research

It’s been all change in Brussels, and innovation now has a new Commissioner. And Máire Geoghegan-Quinn has made it crystal clear that she... More

Keeping an eye on the environment

On June 20th 2012, in the presence of Prime Minister of Denmark Helle Thorning-Schmidt, sustainability legend Gro Harlem Brundtland, IPCC Chair... More

Barcelona and the future for the cloud

A converted chapel in Barcelona is the home for a supercomputing centre that is helping to revolutionise the way we will use cloud computing. More

Enabling technologies in eHealth

Europe and the US may have very different ways of funding health, but they have much in common, too. A new program is exploring what we might learn... More

Hungry? Reach for the cloud…

Superbowl Sunday is big business in the US as people all over the nation tune in to watch the American football match of the year. Pizza deliveries... More

Personalised healthcare: the information challenge

There is one game-changer that can turn the promise of personalised healthcare into a reality. It is healthcare IT, says Alan Davies from GE... More

Robotics gets personal

Huge industrial robots are now a mature industry. Young French entrepreneur Jean-Christophe Baillie believes it is time for them to move from... More

Meet the new biology

Biologists have long had to fight against the idea that theirs is a ‘soft’ science. Now, armed with tools from computer science, they are... More

Inside the cloud

The cloud is one of the most popular terms in IT today but perhaps also one of the least well defined. FUTURES guides you through the how and the why. More

Mundie spells out the challenges

Computer science can play a major role in fuelling scientific breakthroughs in other fields, but only if it can meet its own grand challenges, said... More

Honour for Cambridge lab head

Andrew Herbert has always been fascinated by computing, completing his first degree in computational science in 1975 and since then gaining a PhD from... More

eHealth systems putting the patient at the centre

Interoperability and building trust in the privacy and security of eHealth systems is the route to patient-centric healthcare More

Free multimedia for the developing world

What developing countries need is a stable, sustainable, robust and low-cost means of delivering services and information. More

The Trento algorithm: A research recipe from Italy

Take an ancient town, a new university, Microsoft Research and a fresh approach to computational systems biology. Mix well. Then apply… More

Kiwigrid tames your household energy consumption

There’s a new technology coming into your home. But unlike many, this one should save you money. More

Low carbon: Public-private partnerships take up the challenge

Big challenges can encourage big solutions, and at the end of last year there was no challenge bigger than Europe’s response to the economic... More

Smart software improves environmental forecasting

Environmental scientists face many challenges in monitoring and understanding our planet’s changing climate. More

Computing the energy problem

In May 2009, a Brussels seminar examined the potential of computers to save energy – and the obstacles to realising that potential. More

Life support for the planet: Trees and climate change

Software tools that help researchers to study the role of forests in climate change could make it easier to understand a wide variety of natural and... More

Commission to propose Innovation Act

Is a European Innovation Act what’s needed to make Europe more innovative and strengthen growth and competitiveness in the EU? Policymakers,... More

EMBL’s Peer Bork recognised for work in bioinformatics

Peer Bork, who heads a team of bioinformatic researchers at the Heidelberg, Germany- based European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), has been... More

Albert II visits the Microsoft innovation centre in Mons

On 16 June 2009, the King of Belgium, Albert II, visited one of Belgium’s innovation hotspots, the Digital Innovation Valley in Mons. During the... More

Time to get going again

When the new Commission is appointed, it will find a raft of proposals waiting for it – all aimed at putting research, development and... More

HiBi workshop seeks answers to model questions

Fifty-five researchers met in Trento, Italy, in October to look for collaborative solutions to the limitations that are emerging in the way that... More

Open for innovation

John Wood, Chair of the European Research Area Board, gives a personal assessment of how research needs to change and adapt to face the future. More

Constructive disruption

Microsoft’s Akhtar Badshah wants to be a disruptive influence More

The swarm is coming… Making molecular computing a reality

Inspired by biology, Klaus-Peter Zauner is working on a radically new kind of computer. More

Keep it cool: the greening of Microsoft’s data centers

Microsoft’s first European “mega data centre”, which opened recently on the western outskirts of Dublin, uses 50 per cent less... More

The marriage of maths and ecology

A new research group in Paris aims to use optimisation theory to find answers to the challenges of ensuring an efficient and sustainable future. More

On the agenda: Bridging the industry-university gap

The EU’s education commissioner, Ján Figel’, is pushing for change in European universities – to the economic benefit of all. More

ICT - the way out of the economic crisis

Viviane Reding, European commissioner for all things hi-tech, is known for telling it like it is. A passionate advocate for new technologies, she has... More

A call for global innovation

As the global financial turmoil continues to cast its shadow, government leaders are gathering in Brussels to discuss collaboration. More

European Research Council set for growth, says president

The European Research Council head urges basic research for economic growth – and charts a course for expansion More

Putting computer science to work on biodiversity

As concerns about global warming grow, scientists are turning to sophisticated computational models to better understand and ultimately predict the... More

Green ICT: the industry must lead the way

The European Commission has called on national governments and companies to apply information and communications technology (ICT) solutions to improve... More

Small cameras that not only see, they watch!

Small computing devices, such as enhanced cameras, are becoming smarter and more capable: not only do they record visual input (video) but they are... More

The face in the crowd

Cost-effective face-recognition software has been the springboard for success for one company spun out from the Politecnico di Milano. It has also won... More

The virtual physiological human: The search for computing’s supermodel

Is this the ultimate challenge: to use computational techniques to construct a model of how the human body works? Nuala Moran takes a look. More

Modelling in four dimensions

From conception to birth, death and beyond, the human body is all about change. Thus, a key issue in modelling any aspect of the body is to move... More

Your tissue samples are in the email

It's a simple idea – digitise the results of microscopy and accelerate the healthcare process. One university hospital researcher decided to... More

The wearable camera that brings back the memories

Microsoft’s SenseCam helps advance the study of neuroscience by enabling memory recall and opening the pathway for the development of new... More

Going to extremes: The Research Information Centre

A joint venture between Microsoft Research and the British Library is looking to address the needs of researchers as ‘extreme information... More

No constraints

Youssef Hamadi: applied mathematics researcher and top-flight scientist, directing research projects in Cambridge and Orsay. It's an extraordinary... More

INRIA, gateway to a complex but rich research system

Frances's premier institute for computer science is now developing joint laboratories with international companies, including Microsoft, to tackle... More

Searching questions

Search is increasingly becoming the main way in which people interact with information online, no matter what form it takes or where it is stored... More

Optimising online services for thousands of different types of mobile phones

“The phone has a unique role. While the PC is the most powerful device, the phone is the most popular device… How do we bring all the... More

A helping hand allows Hungarian firm to fund logistics project

Since Hungary's accession into the European Union, the number of logistics operators in the country has been growing fast. This is particularly true... More

Windows Embedded collaborates with European businesses

In February 2008, Microsoft launched the Microsoft Embedded Systems Development Centre (MESDC) in Aachen, Germany. The MESDC was created to foster... More

Ready for innovation

Microsoft's European Growth and Innovation Day brought together policymakers and software developers in Brussels to see how the IT industry can help... More

Innovation clusters: a Charter is born

How do you get a Silicon Valley - or three of them - in Europe? And what can policy makers do to help? These were the themes of an innovative round of... More

Europe must be open to the world

“The creation of a single European Research Area (ERA) - to mirror the single market with the four freedoms of goods, services, people and... More

The way ahead: the Global Lab

The much vaunted globalisation of business and politics has not by-passed the world of R&D. More

Collaboration matters

Even as part of the largest industry computer science research organisation, Microsoft Research does not have a monopoly of talent or ideas, making... More

Microsoft sponsors prestigious award for European research

One of Europe's leading pioneers in the field of medical image analysis has been awarded the €250,000 Royal Society and Académie des... More

Happy birthday, EMIC!

The European Microsoft Innovation Centre (EMIC), in Aachen, Germany, opened five years ago. Since then, it has created an impressive track record in... More

Being Human: human-computer interaction in the year 2020

Computer technologies have suffused the world we live in. They have created change and continue to create change. This is manifest not only on our... More

Putting human values at the forefront

We spoke with Richard Harper, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research Cambridge about the HCI 2020 ‘Being Human’ report. More

Tapping into computing’s sensitive side

Computing has come a long way since the invention of the diminutive mouse. Unlike the keyboard, which was an adaptation of old technology, the mouse... More

Advancing Europe’s goals in Embedded Systems

Microsoft, via its European Microsoft Innovation Centre (EMIC) in Aachen, Germany, is engaged in the ARTEMIS Joint Technology Initiative on scaleable,... More

Saving energy with home automation

As computers become more prevalent in our offices and homes, not only as PCs but also in media and entertainment devices and embedded in appliances,... More

Managing your household energy use

For most consumers, the amount of energy that each electrical appliance in a household consumes is hidden. More

Next generation devices: pocket supercomputers for doctors

Are we prepared for the next generation of embedded and mobile computing devices? More

What a GIG!

One of the gigs at this year's Roskilde Festival, the largest music festival in Europe, didn't take place on the stage but in the trash. Microsoft... More

WearIT

Handheld computers for issuing tickets, reading meters, recording environmental data or taking orders are commonplace. Now attention has shifted to... More

PHAROS: Lighting the way for European audiovisual search

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Microsoft Search Technology Center

FUTURES spoke with Jordi Ribas, head of the new Microsoft Search Technology Center. More

Collecting data on the environment

European Environment Agency and Microsoft Eye on Earth Observatory bring Europaan beach quality into sharp focus More

Grant funding helps instant messaging startup go global

Paris-based startup Miyowa enlisted the support of European Union Grants Advisor (EUGA) and successfully applied for government funding to develop... More

Forming innovation clusters

Cluster Stew: the European Commission is formulating an all-embracing strategy on cluster development to boost innovation and maximise returns from... More

How to solve the cluster equation?

In 1997, Microsoft opened its first big European lab – and it placed it in what was then Europe's only serious answer to Silicon Valley:... More

Wanted: more ‘gazelles’ in Europe

The Science|Business Innovation Board says Europe's innovation policies need to change, to encourage high-growth entrepreneurs. More

Rewarding enterprise on campus

It’s a familiar story: invented in Europe, commercialised abroad. More

Developing tomorrow’s embedded computers

Research and development in highly complex fields – such as embedded computer systems – relies heavily on partnerships in which the... More

How creativity toolkits and virtual collaborative environments accelerate each other

Computing pervades everyday life: whether used in business or leisure, by individuals or communities, it offers opportunities for new ways of living... More

Coming to your screen: the high-definition Internet

In an era of continual Internet innovation, one of the biggest trends is the Internet’s rapid growth as a platform for rich, high-definition... More

The new ‘HD view’ of photography

Just when you thought there was nothing new in pictures, along comes HD View and explodes all your preconceptions about what photography can do. More

Photosynth: creating 3D photographic experiences of time and place

The Photosynth experience justifies the use of the old truism: it has to be seen to be believed. More

Hail the conquerator and release the sheep

Earlier this year Microsoft Research Cambridge, in partnership with Microsoft’s XNA Game Studio team, Lionhead Studios and Rare Ltd, brought... More

Interfacing with robots: do robots do what we want them to do?

Programming an industrial robot is still an annoying task that requires too many details and expert knowledge. Each robot unit needs to be installed... More

Archiving for the family

One of the current projects of the Socio-Digital Systems Group atMicrosoft Research in Cambridge is ‘Family Archive’. This work arose from... More

Hungarian start-up secures 100 per cent funding for photosmart project

Budapest-based start-up eSpirit sought help from European Union Grants Advisor (EUGA) and applied for government funding to develop a new Web-based... More

Exploring the globe

As more and more people share data and opinions over the Internet, geographic and location information is becoming an increasingly important dimension... More

Browsing the real world

New geoweb applications such as Microsoft’s Virtual Earth are at the confluence of two massive innovation trends – user-generated content... More

The 3-D city

Football supporters and other visitors to this summer's Euro2008 football championships in Austria and Switzerland can enjoy a new experience as they... More

Computerised excavations in Pompeii

Imagine a search engine capable of recognising the details of paintings rather than words. This is the challenge facing a joint Microsoft/INRIA... More

Model your own climate

Few research issues are as significant as trying to work out how climate change might affect the environment. Unlike many scientific experiments, this... More

When geographic intelligence goes mainstream…

“When I'm making plans for my spare time, the most convenient way to do it is to ask for the location and places of restaurants, tourist sites... More

Complexity: tackling large systems in science and engineering

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Verifying 50,000 lines of C code

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Barcelona supercomputing center and Microsoft create joint research centre for parallel computing

On 18 January 2008, Microsoft and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) announced the creation of the BSC – Microsoft Research Centre, which... More

When computers come to the aid of mathematics

“Mathematics must make a great leap forward”: this is the challenge that Georges Gonthier has set himself. More

A lifeline for systems biology

It is a fact universally acknowledged: the pharmaceutical industry needs a new drug development paradigm. Systems biology promises the ability to... More

Genomics and proteomics: the emerging role of machine learning

Computing and communication technologies have already had a massive impact on today's healthcare system. Even so, there is great potential for these... More

Europe’s digital future: the challenges ahead

The Lisbon Strategy's aim is to make the EU ‘the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable... More

A look in the crystal ball: Craig Mundie on the future of computing

The free lunch is over For the past 20 years the computer industry has grown on the back of ever-increasing clock rates. In line with Moore's law,... More

Systems biology under the microscope

You can't capture the thrill and excitement of a football match by describing the individual players. Similarly, it is not possible to understand... More

Europe’s place on the IT map

In the global village, goes the standard economic theory, every region should have its own set of specialised skills to trade with the rest of the... More

A push to reform the way EUROPE does research

“EUROPE has a team of star players, but it is not a star team.” That frank assessment of EUROPE's weaknesses and strengths in research was... More

The researchers’ directive

Implementation of the Directive by member states is essential to the paradigm of ‘brain circulation' and the development of the European... More

The next phase of the IPTV revolution

Merely a concept at the start of the century, Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) has already completed the first stage of its growth, moving from an idea to... More

Microsoft mediaroom: Microsoft’s connected TV services platform

Driven by computer and network technologies, TV is undergoing a paradigm shift that is not only changing TV itself but also how people consume media... More

European Microsoft innovation center (EMIC): overcoming information overload and ‘the crisis of choice'

Year by year, the flood of content is rising all around us: television channels, books, music and the Internet - where not only traditional media but... More

Livestation the ‘spark of live’ TV on your computer

Back in 2001, Matteo Berlucchi, an Italian entrepreneur and academic, was ploughing through his email inbox trying to sort out the important messages... More

Austrian start-up secures funding for video telephony project

Vienna-based start-up IQ Mobile found that obtaining funding to develop innovative solutions was a straightforward exercise. It was awarded 15 per... More

Internet telephony: global innovation in the heart of europe

Today, the efficient and innovative distribution and processing of information is at the core of all business activity – so the effects of new... More

A 2020 vision for global research libraries

Global Research Library 2020 (GRL 2020) is an initiative of the University of Washington Libraries and Microsoft Corporation to bring together global... More

The tablet PC and mathematics

The Tablet PC has broadened our concept of how we use a personal computer: a mobile computer with a screen that allows for inputs via a pen or... More

Pushing the boundaries in graphics hardware

The folks at RARE, one of the iconic pioneers in computer gaming, like to joke that the quiet surrounds of their headquarters, deep in the UK... More

“What if …?” - Breaking new ground in enterprise resource planning visualisation

What if you could get assistance for your complicated business decisions by simply going through various What-If scenarios and having them visualised... More

Sophisticated graphic website and advert-tracking software set for 2008 launch

The phenomenal growth of online advertising is driving demand for smarter tools to track results: enabling advertisers to see clearly how many people... More

Virtualisation technology transforms old mining site in Portugal into a leading centre for scientific education and research

Thanks to a unique partnership between the public, private and academic sectors in Portugal and Brazil, the decommissioned pyrite mine in Lousal, in... More

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