The Finnish Centre of Excellence in
Computational Inference Research (COIN)

The Finnish Centre of Excellence in Computational Inference Research (COIN) develops methods for transforming the data produced by the current data revolution into useful information. The key methodology for achieving this goal is statistical and computational inference based on the data. The emphasis is on large data collections and computationally demanding modelling and inference algorithms. Our mission is to push the boundary towards both more complex problems, requiring more sructured data models, and towards extremely rapid inference. COIN brings in expertise on several different approaches to inference, with a unique opportunity to address the core computational challenges with combinations of machine learning, computational statistics, statistical physics, and constraint-based search and optimization.

Chek out:

COIN Biennial report 2012-2013 (pdf)
NEW! COIN Biennial report 2014-2015 now available (pdf)!

We work on two flagship applications. In the Intelligent Information Access flagship, the challenge is to make use of massive interrelated information sources, whether in everyday life or in science, and select what information to present to the user. The inference needs to be done on-line, learning relevance from the user's responses. In the Computational Biology and Medicine flagship, we develop methods for maximally utilizing the novel measurement databases and structured stochastic models in making data-driven biology cumulative. In addition to these two flagship applications, we work on a few additional test-bench applications in collaboration with selected top-level application partners, from science and industry.

Keywords: massive data, multiple data sources, highly structured stochastic models, extreme inference.

Principal Investigators and their groups

Samuel Kaski Professor, Director of COIN	Jukka Corander Professor, Deputy Director of COIN	Erik Aurell Professor	Jorma Laaksonen Docent, D.Sc.(Tech.)	Petri Myllymäki Professor	Ilkka Niemelä Professor	Erkki Oja Professor Emeritus