Seminars

The central registration for all computer science seminars will open on September 14th.

This system is used to distribute students among the available seminars offered by the CS department. To register for any of the seminars, you have to apply here until October 14th, 20:00 CET. You can select which seminar you would like to take, and will then be automatically assigned to one of them by October 16th.

Please note the following:

We aim to provide a fair mapping that respects your wishes, but at the same time also respects the preferences of your fellow students. Experience has shown that particular seminars are more popular than others, yet these seminars cannot fit all students. Please only select seminars if you are certain that you actually do want to complete a seminar this semester. If you have already obtained sufficient seminar credits, or plan to take other courses this semester, please do not choose any seminars. Students who drop out of seminars take away places from those, who might urgently need a space or are strongly interested in the topic. We encourage those students who wish to take a seminar this semester, to select their preferences for all available seminars, which eases the process to assign students that do not fit the overly popular seminars to another, less crowded one. So if you are serious about taking a seminar this semester, please select at least three seminars (with priority from "High" to "Low"). If you urgently need to be assigned to a seminar in the upcoming semester, choose at least five seminars (with priority from "High" to "Low"). The system will then prioritize you for assigning a seminar (yet not necessarily your top choice). If you are really dedicated to one particular seminar, and you do not want any other seminar, please select the "No seminar" as second and third positive option. However, this may ultimately lead to the situation that you are not assigned to any seminar. Also, choosing "No seminar" as second/third option does not increase your chances of getting your first choice. The assignment will be performed by a constraint solver. You will be added to the respective seminars automatically and be notified about this shortly thereafter. Please note that the assignment cannot be optimal for all students if you drop the assigned seminar, i.e., make only serious choices to avoid penalty to others.

Automata Learning: Learnability of Computational Models by Swen Jacobs

Your IDE highlights a syntax error the moment you type it. Your compiler knows that the parentheses are unbalanced before you even run the program. These tools know the rules of the language -- but how did they get that knowledge? In most cases, the rules were written by hand. But what if they weren't? What if a system could figure out the rules just by observing examples?

This is the central question of automata learning: given labeled examples of instances that belong (or do not belong) to some unknown language, can we automatically reconstruct a compact, correct model of it?

The idea may feel familiar to many of you, coming from different directions. In machine learning, the goal is also to recover a hidden model from labeled instances. In security, an adversary observing the inputs and outputs of a black-box system is trying to reverse-engineer what is happening inside. In software testing, a tool that infers a model of a protocol from observed network traces can then check whether the implementation behaves correctly. These are all instances of the same underlying problem.

In this seminar, we study the problem from a theoretical angle. We ask and answer four recurring questions about different classes of computational models: Can we always infer a correct model from a labeled sample? Is finding the smallest consistent model computationally tractable? How much data do we need to guarantee correct learning? And can we learn efficiently by asking questions, rather than passively receiving examples?

During this class, students will learn how to read a scientific text and how to give a scientific presentation. Each student reads up on an assigned topic and teaches the results to their fellow students.

Talks: We expect you to give two talks on your assigned topic: an ungraded short practice talk, after which you will receive detailed feedback, and a graded final talk of 30 minutes.

Feedback and Discussion: Attendance at all talks is mandatory. We expect you to provide feedback to your fellow students after the practice talks and to participate in discussions after the final talks.

More information will be made available here: https://cms.cispa.saarland/alprosem26/

Requirements: We expect you to be comfortable with basic mathematical reasoning and to have the ability to think about abstract concepts. Some familiarity with automata and formal languages is helpful, but we will cover all necessary background in the first two sessions.

Places: 12

Computer Architecture by Abdullah Giray Yaglikci and Michael Schwarz

This seminar covers cutting-edge and seminal research papers, focusing on fundamental research problems in the field of computer architecture. Relevant topics include: security and reliability of microarchitecture, memory, and storage, new and emerging paradigms in computer architecture (e.g., data-centric processing), energy efficiency, hardware/software co-design, and fault tolerance.

Course Website for Summer 2026 : https://cms.cispa.saarland/comparch_s26/

Requirements: A strong foundation of computer architecture is needed for this seminar.

Places: 5

Does Copilot Really Understand my Code? Methods for Mechanistic Interpretability of LLMs by Sven Apel, Kingsley Kuan, Anna-Maria Maurer, Youssef Abdelsalam

Code LLMs have become ubiquitous in software understanding and development. However, despite their increasing integration into development workflows, they remain black-box models. What do these AI models actually understand about code, and what methods can we use to peek under the hood? What correlational and causal relationships or characteristics can be identified?

In this seminar, students will read and critically discuss papers about methods for mechanistic interpretability, as well as familiarize themselves with these methods in short demos. Throughout the semester, they will formulate research questions targeting assigned topics centering diverse aspects of code, design small experiments for these questions using these methods, and then apply them to analyze what code LLMs represent internally and how information flows through the transformer architecture. Each student will be supported by a dedicated advisor and receive feedback throughout the semester. The seminar concludes with a final report and research presentations in which each participant presents their results and reflects on their implications.

Kick-Off Meeting: Thursday, 22 October 2026

The seminar takes place during the semester on Thursdays from 12:00 - 14:00 (~12 sessions in sum) and in addition final presentation sessions during the lecture free period.

Participation in all sessions is mandatory, as is the submission of all assignments.

For further information, please visit: https://cms.sic.saarland/se_seminar_ws_2627/

Requirements: This seminar is open to motivated Bachelor and Master students who are eager to understand the inner workings of LLMs while critically and empirically examining their behavior. Prior knowledge of LLMs and transformer architectures is recommended, along with general programming experience.

Places: 5

Living AI-ducation Dashboard by Tomohiro Nagashima, Sarah Malone

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming everyday lives, including education, and it requires us to have a deep understanding of research insights into its applications and implications in the field. This seminar aims to equip students with the knowledge and skills needed to critically analyze AI in education and contribute to this evolving field. The seminar is jointly taught by Prof. Dr. Tomohiro Nagashima in the CS department and Dr. Sarah Malone in the Education Science department, and it targets students in both departments!

During the seminar, students will collaboratively design and develop a “Living AI-education Dashboard,” a dynamic resource that summarizes and visualizes current research, trends, and data on AI in education. Through project-based learning, students will gain hands-on experience in data visualization, dashboard development, dashboard design, and research methods (e.g., how to conduct systematic literature review). Students may also be testing the dashboard with “real” stakeholders. They will also develop interdisciplinary thinking by integrating concepts from both computer science and education science and through collaborations across the domains. The course is taught by an interdisciplinary team that encourages collaboration between departments and prepares students to tackle complex, real-world problems.

See more info: https://lala.cs.uni-saarland.de/teaching/

Requirements: None, but those with experience of developing visualizations would be prioritized (if you have experience with data vis, indicate it in the motivation statement).

Places: 4

Nature-Inspired Optimisation by Joachim Weickert

In millions of years, nature has developed a wide variety of survival strategies. Many of them are simple, but still allow to tackle complex problems and tasks. In this proseminar, we will explore algorithms inspired by nature that can be used to solve optimization problems. This includes e.g. genetic algorithms and methods inspired by swarm behavior. The seminar is based on the book "Nature-Inspired Metaheuristic Algorithms" by Xin-She Yang.

Seminar website: https://www.mia.uni-saarland.de/Teaching/nio26.shtml

Requirements: The proseminar is designed for bachelor students of a mathematics or computer science study program. They are supposed to have some basic mathematical knowledge (e.g. Mathematics for Computer Scientists I-III) The proseminar is conducted in English. This includes the meetings, presentations, write-ups, and the literature.

Places: 12

Privacy Systems and Applications Seminar by Wouter Lueks and Sylvain Chatel

As technology becomes prevalent, we carry more and more devices everywhere we go and our digital trail becomes more and more pronounced. On the one hand, digitalization brings enormous benefits. On the other hand, it makes it almost much easier to violate user's privacy, to surveil large fractions of a population, and sometimes even to control or influence what people do and think.

 In this seminar, we will look at privacy-enhancing technologies, digital means that can help counteract this reduction in privacy caused by increasing digitalization. You will read, discuss, and present new and seminal papers to learn about new techniques and ideas in the field of privacy-enhancing technologies.

Example of topics covered include: Systems for End-to-End Privacy, Anonymous Communication Systems, Private Set Intersection, Private Information Retrieval, Fully-Homomorphic Encryption, Censorship Resistance Systems.

Students will present, write reviews, and write a paper. See https://cms.cispa.saarland/psas26/ for a full overview.

Requirements: Basics of cryptography and security: required

Places: 6

Real-Time Control of Underwater Robots by Martina Maggio

Underwater robots operate in one of the most demanding settings in all of robotics. There is no GPS to localise them, the hydrodynamic forces acting on them are strongly nonlinear and only partially known, and disturbances are everywhere: underwater currents, surface waves, and buoyancy that shifts with salinity and payload. On top of this, the vehicle must make every decision on its own, in real time, on limited onboard hardware. The distance between an elegant controller on paper and one that actually keeps a robot on course in the water is large, and bridging it is a genuinely open and active research problem.

This seminar examines how that gap is being closed. Through a set of papers, spanning foundational work from the 2010s to results from the last two years, we will study the control methods that let autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), and vehicle–manipulator systems hold position, track trajectories, and stay safe despite uncertainty and disturbance.

The papers form a coherent arc across the main families of approaches:

- Robust and adaptive control: classical feedback designs that remain stable when the vehicle model is inaccurate, which underwater it always is.
- Predictive control: methods that anticipate future disturbances and plan control actions over a horizon, including for docking and manipulation tasks.
- Safety-critical control: techniques that provide formal guarantees a vehicle will not violate safety constraints, for example when operating close to a structure.
- Learning-based control: recent reinforcement-learning and sim-to-real approaches, where policies are trained in simulation and transferred to real vehicles, and where learning is combined with classical control architectures.

Throughout, the methods are tied to real platforms and tasks: AUVs validated in open water, an ROV cleaning an offshore monopile, a vehicle docking with a moving station, and an underactuated AUV performing agile manoeuvres near a glacier front.

However, this is not only a literature review. Our concrete aim is to identify a few control methods that we can realistically implement on our own ROV (a vehicle that is currently operated manually and that we would like to turn into an automated system). The seminar therefore doubles as the groundwork for a real implementation decision: by the end, the group should be able to argue, on the basis of the literature, which approaches are the most promising candidates to put into practice.

The seminar follows a scientific-discussion model in which we collectively build an understanding of the field and its related work:

- Introductory session. We give an overview of the topics, discuss how the papers fit together, and assign one paper to each student.
- Presentations. Each student reads their assigned papers in depth and prepares a presentation explaining the problem they address, their core idea, and their results.
- Prepared discussion. For every presentation, the other students read the same paper in advance and prepare questions. Each session is therefore a genuine scientific discussion rather than a one-way talk.

By participating, you will learn how to read and critically assess a research paper, how to identify the key idea behind a technical contribution, and how to present and defend it in front of others, while contributing to a shared practical goal. Attendance is mandatory.

Additional information will be posted at https://cms.sic.saarland/underwater_2627/

Requirements: Curiosity about robotics and control, and a basic mathematical background, are sufficient. The core lecture cyber-physical systems is a plus. No prior experience with underwater robotics is required.

Places: 15

The Web Security Seminar by Giancarlo Pellegrino

The Web is the foundation of much of today's digital infrastructure: it connects users, services, devices, businesses, and critical applications across the globe. Its openness and ubiquity make it extraordinarily powerful, but also a constant target for attacks. Understanding Web Security therefore means understanding one of the most important and continuously evolving security frontiers.

This seminar explores that frontier through recent scientific papers, open problems, and the arguments that shape where the field is heading next. The focus is not only on learning about advanced technical topics, but on learning how to read, analyze, discuss, and critically evaluate research papers.

This year, The Web Security Seminar is offered both as a seminar and as a proseminar.

In both formats, students will work on advanced topics in Web Security through a combination of presentations and reading-group-style discussions. Each topic is centered around recent research papers, which students will use to understand the state of the art, identify strengths and limitations, and discuss how the work advances the field.

Seminar students will give a presentation and write a seminar paper.

Proseminar students will give a presentation, but will not write a seminar paper.

More information: https://cms.cispa.saarland/websecsem_wise26

This seminar adopts a strict no-LLMs/GenAI policy. The goal of the course is for students to develop and exercise their own critical thinking when reading, analyzing, and discussing research papers. For this reason, all intellectual work in the seminar, including presentations, discussions, and seminar papers, must be carried out independently and without the aid of generative AI tools.

Requirements: Students are expected to already know the basics of the Web and Web development, such as HTTP, TLS, HTML, and JavaScript. They should also be familiar with basic Web Security issues such as web vulnerabilities like XSS and SQLi.

Students interested in this seminar must clearly and concisely describe their background in Web and Web Security in the motivation box. This should include relevant courses, and, if any, practical experience or other prior exposure to Web technologies and Web Security.

Places: 5

Usable Security in the Last Decade by Katharina Krombholz

Usable Security or Human-centric Security is a relatively new interdisciplinary field that studies the human factor of security and privacy challenges. In this seminar, we will read and discuss the most influential papers from this field that were published in the last 10 years. You will learn about the human side of security and privacy challenges, read interesting distinguished papers and furthermore enhance your presentation skills

Places: 8