 | |
| Type | National research institute |
|---|---|
| Established | 1946; 79 years ago (1946) |
| President | Prof.dr. A.G. de Kok |
Administrative staff | ~200 |
| Location | , |
| Website | www |
 | |
TheCentrum Wiskunde & Informatica (abbr.CWI; English: "National Research Institute for Mathematics and Computer Science") is a research centre in the field ofmathematics andtheoretical computer science. It is part of the institutes organization of theDutch Research Council (NWO) and is located at theAmsterdam Science Park. This institute is famous as the creation site of the programming languagePython. It was a founding member of the European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics (ERCIM).
The institute was founded in 1946 byJohannes van der Corput,David van Dantzig,Jurjen Koksma,Hendrik Anthony Kramers,Marcel Minnaert andJan Arnoldus Schouten. It was originally calledMathematical Centre (in Dutch:Mathematisch Centrum). One early mission was to develop mathematical prediction models to assist large Dutch engineering projects, such as theDelta Works. During this early period, the Mathematics Institute also helped with designing the wings of theFokker F27 Friendship airplane, voted in 2006 as the most beautiful Dutch design of the 20th century.[1][2]
The computer science component developed soon after.Adriaan van Wijngaarden, considered the founder of computer science (orinformatica) in the Netherlands, was the director of the institute for almost 20 years.Edsger Dijkstra did most of his early influential work on algorithms and formal methods at CWI. The first Dutch computers, theElectrologica X1 andElectrologica X8, were both designed at the centre, andElectrologica was created as a spinoff to manufacture the machines.
In 1983, the name of the institute was changed to Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) to reflect a governmental push for emphasizing computer science research in the Netherlands.[3]
The institute is known for its work in fields such asoperations research,software engineering, information processing, and mathematical applications inlife sciences andlogistics.More recent examples of research results from CWI include the development of scheduling algorithms for the Dutch railway system (theNederlandse Spoorwegen, one of the busiest rail networks in the world) and the development of thePython programming language byGuido van Rossum. Python has played an important role in the development of theGoogle search platform from the beginning, and it continues to do so as the system grows and evolves.[4] Many information retrieval techniques used by packages such asSPSS were initially developed by Data Distilleries, a CWIspinoff.[5][6]
Work at the institute was recognized by national or international research awards, such as theLanchester Prize (awarded yearly byINFORMS), theGödel Prize (awarded byACM SIGACT) and theSpinoza Prize. Most of its senior researchers hold part-time professorships at other Dutch universities, with the institute producing over 170 full professors during the course of its history. Several CWI researchers have been recognized as members of theRoyal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, theAcademia Europaea, or as knights in theOrder of the Netherlands Lion.[7]
In February 2017, CWI in association withGoogle announced a successfulcollision attack onSHA 1 encryption algorithm.[8]
CWI was an early user of theInternet in Europe, in the form of aTCP/IP connection toNSFNET.Piet Beertema at CWI established one of the first two connections outside the United States to the NSFNET (shortly after France'sINRIA)[9][10][11] forEUnet on 17 November 1988. The first Dutchcountry code top-level domain issued was cwi.nl.[12][13][14] When this domain cwi.nl was registered, on 1 May 1986,.nl effectively became the first activeccTLD outside theUnited States.[15] For the first ten years CWI, or rather Beertema, managed the .nl administration, until in 1996 this task was transferred to its spin-off SIDN.[12]
TheAmsterdam Internet Exchange (one of the largest Internet Exchanges in the world, in terms of both members and throughput traffic) is located at the neighbouringSARA (an early CWI spin-off) andNikhef institutes. TheWorld Wide Web Consortium (W3C) office for the Benelux countries is located at CWI.[16]
CWI has demonstrated a continuing effort to put the work of its researchers at the disposal of society, mainly by collaborating with commercial companies and creating spin-off businesses. In 2000 CWI established "CWI Incubator BV", a dedicated company with the aim to generate high tech spin-off companies.[17] Some of the CWI spinoffs include:[18]
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| People | |
| Other | |
52°21′23″N4°57′07″E / 52.35639°N 4.95194°E /52.35639; 4.95194
