Building Bridges 2025

Class meetings (A1, A2, B, C) and YAE meeting 

Class A1 – Welcome and brief self-presentations by new members at Charles Darwin room

Class A2 – Welcome and brief self-presentations by new members at Marie Curie room

Class B – Welcome and brief self-presentations by new members at Ramon y Cajal room

Class C – 09:00-09:15 Introduction to Class and its sections at Auditorium
09:15-11:00 Welcome and short introductions by participating new members

11.00-11.20

11.00-11.30

Coffee break for Class C

 Coffee Break for Class A1, A2 and B

Continuation of Class meetings and Hub managers closed session

Hub managers closed Session: Meeting of AE Hub managers (Rita Levi-Montalcini room)

Class A1: Welcome and brief self-presentations by new members, continued. (Charles Darwin room)
Discussion: The Humanities and the Humanities Class. Challenges and prospects.

Class A2: “Rethinking Social Science in an Age of Rupture: Viable Futures for Democracy, Prosperity, and Sociality within Ecological Limits” (Marie Curie room). This session invites Class A2 members to reflect critically on the role of the social sciences in addressing today’s defining challenges. Rather than only diagnosing crises, how can our disciplines actively shape alternative futures?

Rob van Tulder, MAE, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Growth and beyond: Social innovation, sustainable prosperity, and global public goods

Jonathan White, MAE, London School of Economics, London, United Kingdom

Democratic resilience and climate breakdown

Chris Hann, MAE, Planck Institute, Halle, Germany

Freedom, work, and transitions in a decarbonizing/digitalizing economy

Antje Wiener, MAE, University of Hamburg, Germany

From ruptures to a new global order

Class B: Brief presentations by new members, continued. (Ramon y Cajal room)

Class C: Highlight talks from new members in each section (Auditorium)

Introductions by Section Chairs

11:20-11:45 Julia Vorholt, MAE, ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Establishing causality: Opportunities of synthetic communities for plant microbiome research

Chair: Ray Dixon, MAE, John Innes Centre, Norwich, United Kingdom

11:45-12:10 Jiri Friml, MAE, ISTA, Vienna, Austria

Rewriting the Rules of Plant Signalling: The Surprising Role of cAMP

Chair: Crisanto Gutierrez, Centro de Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa, Madrid, Spain

12:10-12:35 Monica Di Luca, MAE, University of Milan, Italy

Dynamic synapses and the long arm to the nucleus

Chair: Balázs Gulyás, MAE, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm

12:35-13:00 Milan Chytrý, MAE Masaryk University, Czech Republic

Biodiversity loss in European vegetation

Chair: András Báldi, MAE, Centre for Ecological Research, Institute of Ecology and Botany, Vácrátót, Hungary

Continued Class sessions and YAE Meeting

Class A1:

14-16 Linguistics section workshop. (Rita Levi-Montalcini room)
14-16 Film, Media and Visual Studies workshop. (Rosalind Franklin room)
14-15 All other A1 sections [session in common] The Humanities and the Humanities Class. Challenges and prospects, continued. (Charles Darwin room)

Class A2:

14-15 Coffee and Conversations. Informal discussions at thematic tables followed by brief reporting from each group. (Marie Curie room)

Joint session of Classes A1 and A2 (Marie Curie room)

15-16 Discussion on the 5th EU Freedom/Letta Report.

Chairs: Genoveva Martí, MAE, ICREA  at University of Barcelona and  Chair Class A1 and Björn Wittrock, MAE, Director AE College of Excellence and Chair Class A2

The discussion will be introduced by Thomas Sturm, MAE, (ICREA at Autonomous University of Barcelona). Comments by Janez Potočnik, former EU commissioner of science and research (2004-2010) and for the environment (2010-2014).

Class B: Artificial Intelligence Workshop with presentations by (Ramon y Cajal room)

Metin Sitti, MAE, Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey

ML for Small-Scale Soft Robot Design and Control

Lionel Briand, MAE, LERO, University of Limerick, Ireland

Automated Testing and Safety Analysis of Deep Neural Networks 

Rachid Guerraoui, MAE, EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland

Towards a Safe AI

Erol Gelenbe. MAE, IITIS-PAN, Gliwice, Poland

Random Neural Networks: Parametrization and Learning for Cyberattack Detection

Class C: (Auditorium)

14:00-14:25 Csaba Szabo, MAE, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

NO, CO, H2S, CN: the growing family of mammalian gaseous transmitters

Chair: Balázs Gulyás, MAE, Karolinska Institute,
Stockholm, Sweden

14:25- 14:50 Stefan M. Pfister, MAE, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany

Molecular tumor classification – translating discoveries into patient benefit

Chair: Péter Hegyi, MAE, Translational Medicine at University of Pécs, Budapest, Hungary

14:50- 15:55 Future activities and planning; membership and task force topics. Open discussion related to views of the section chairs and potential reform of sections; overview of the membership, including missing candidates and emerging/underrepresented fields; the potential for new task force topics and involvement of YAE.

Coffee break

Special Lecture  (Auditorium)

Chair: Björn Wittrock, Director AE College of Excellence and Chair Class A2

Philippe Aghion, MAE, Collège de France, Paris ; Erasmus Medal winner 2021

Should we fear AI?

08.30- 09.00

09.00-10.30

Opening of Plenary conferece

– Don Dingwell, MAE, President elected of Academia Europaea

– Jaume Bertranpetit, MAE, Director of the Barcelona Hub

– Janez Potočnik, former EU commissioner

 – Erasmus Medal Winner 2025

Laudatio by János Pach, MAE, Rényi Institute of Mathematics (Budapest) & EPFL (Lausanne)

Lecture by Lászlò Lovàsz, MAE, Eötvös Lórand University, Budapest, Hungary

The Beuaty of Mathematics

General session by Class B: Exact Sciences

Chair: Paolo Papale, MAE, Instituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Italy, Chair Class B

– Hans Oerlemans, MAE, Balzan Prize 2022, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

 The role of glaciers in the evolution of the Earth

– Licia Verde, MAE ICREA at University of Barcelona, Spain

Precision cosmology: threading a needle from the other end of the Universe

– Eugenio Coccia, MAE, IFAE and Rector of the Gran Sasso Science Institute and Institute for High Energy Physics Barcelona, Spain

Gravitational Waves: from the Einstein prediction to the Einstein Telescope

Sydney Brenner Memorial

Laudatio by Kathryn Lilley, MAE, University of Cambridge,United Kingdom

Lecture by Dr. Markus Ralser, Charité, Berlin, Germany

The Dynamic Nature of Cellular Metabolism

General sessions by Class C: Life Sciences

Chair: Eva Kondorosi, MAE, Biological Research Centre, Hungary, Chair Class C chair

– Dennis Lo, MAE, Vice-Chancellor and President, Li Ka Shing Professor of Medicine at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK)

 Non-invasive Prenatal Testing and Cancer Detection: From Dream to Reality

– Jens Stougaard, MAE, Winner of Adam Kondorosi Academia Europaea Prize for Advanced Research 2025, Aarhus University, Denmark

 Plant perception of microbial signal molecules

– Mart Saarma, MAE, President of the Estonian Academy of Scince University of Helsinki, Finland

New approaches to treat neurodegenerative diseases

ANDRÉ MISCHKE Lecture by Agnieszka Wykowska, MAE, Instituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Genova, Italy

Presentation by Scott Bremer, President of  YAE, University of Bergen, Norway

Human-robots interaction: How robots can address sociaetal needs

General Sessions by Class A1: Humanities

Chair: Genoveva Martí, MAE, ICREA at University of Barcelona, Spain and Chari Class A1

– Mark Steedman, MAE, University of Edingburgh, Scotland

Natural Language and Artificial Intelligence

– Johan Rooryck, MAE, Leiden University, The Netherlands

Towards Equitable Open Access Publishing

– Louise McNally, MAE, Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain

Open Access Meets Large Language Models Meets Reserch Evaluation Policy: A View from the Trenches

General sessions by Class A2: Social and Related Sciences

Chair: Martin Kahanec, MAE, Central European University, Vienna, Austria
Panel Theme: Democracy, Prosperity, and Sociality within Planetary Boundaries

This high-level, interdisciplinary plenary brings together perspectives from the natural and social sciences and humanities to consider how societies can live well within planetary boundaries. Rather than seeing ecological limits as constraints, how might they serve as catalysts for democratic renewal, equity, and innovation? Transforming the way we live requires more than technological fixes—it calls for approaches that are culturally grounded, inclusive, and responsive to lived realities. Experiences such as vaccine uptake highlight the limitations of top-down strategies. Climate change, as an anthropogenic and socially embedded phenomenon, illustrates how well-intended actions can produce unintended consequences. Here, the social sciences play a critical role in shaping just and viable pathways forward.

– Guy Midgley, Stellenbosch University, South Africa

 Planetary boundaries and the fragility of abundance

– Nebojsa Nakicenovic, MAE, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria

 Safe, Just and Beautiful Future within Planetary Boundaries

– Hartmut Rosa, MAE, Max Weber Centre of Advanced Cultural and Social Studies, University of Erfurt, Erfurt, Germany

 Running For – Or Listening Towards the Future? Two Alternative Visions of the World to Come

– Isabelle Anguelovski, MAE, ICREA at University Autonomous of Barcelona, Spain

Climate (Im)Mobilities Justice: Displacement, Segregation, Resistance, and the Uneven Geographies of Urban Adaptation

Open session organized by the Young Academy of Europe (YAE)

Public trust in science and navigating political tensions

Public trust in scientists can help policymaking institutions to decide on the basis of available evidence, but we witness recent political hostilities towards research institutions, and academic freedom and integrity. Indeed, the boundary between science and politics has always been contested, with some seeking to harden this boundary, while others see it as more malleable. And at the same time, most people today trust scientists and agree that they should engage more in society. Against this background, this panel will host multiple perspectives on how scientists – as individuals and as a group – navigate social and political polarization on the role and organisation of science in Europe today. To the extent that scientists work within a politicised context, what affordances and strategies do they deploy to establish science’s role in society and relate to political trends.

Moderator: Scott Bremer,  President of YAE, University of Bergen, Norway

Panelists:

Ruth Rodriguez-Martínez (SH), Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain

Anna Kuppuswamy (LS), YAE, University of Leeds, United Kingdom

Emilian Mihailov (SH), YAE, University of Bucharest, Romania

Marta Sánchez de la Torre, University of Barcelona, Spain

Art and Science Lecture by Marta de Menezes, Lisboa, Portugal

Art and Immunology – A Love Story

Presented by Monica Bello, Art Curator, Geneve and Barcelona