Monday, July 8, 2024

[DMANET] HIGHLIGHTS '24: Registration Deadline Extended to July 13

Dear all,

The registration deadline for HIGHLIGHTS 2024 and Jewels of Automata Theory
2024 has been extended to **July 13, 2024**. (See CfP below.)

*Registration page:*
https://framaforms.org/highlights-and-jewels-of-automata-theory-2024-1715936947
HIGHLIGHTS'24, JEWELS OF AUTOMATA THEORY '24, (Bordeaux, France, 16-20
September 2024) AND HCRW (21-27 September)

*HIGHLIGHTS'24* and *Jewels of Automata Theory '24* are jointly scheduled *from
September 16 to September 20, 2024* at the *University of Bordeaux, France*,
in *LaBRI*. They will be followed by the *Highlights Collaborative Research
Week (HCRW)*, from *September 21 to 27, 2024*.

*HIGHLIGHTS'24* is the twelfth in the series of international conferences
"Highlights of Logic, Games and Automata", aiming at integrating the
community working in algorithmic model theory, automata theory, databases,
games for logic and verification, logic and verification. Papers from these
areas are dispersed across many conferences, which makes them difficult to
follow. A visit to the HIGHLIGHTS conference should offer a wide picture of
the latest research in the field and a chance to meet everybody in the
community, not just those who happen to publish in one particular
proceedings volume. There are no publications.

Jewels of Automata Theory 2024 will survey a wide picture of research in
automata theory and related mathematical fields. It will consist of invited
lectures which describe significant progress over the past years, and will
be a meeting point for both young and senior researchers to learn and to
discuss about automata theory, its connections with mathematics and its
applications.

*HIGHLIGHTS'24* key features:

- HIGHLIGHTS is a conference without publications, where speakers give
short presentations of their best work.
- The 2024 edition is colocated with Jewels of Automata Theory a
conference featuring invited talks on mathematical aspects of automata
theory.
- A chat of the conference is available during the event, and throughout
the year.
- There is an early round of submissions and notifications to help with
travel planning.
- The *Highlights' Collaborative Research Week* (*HCRW*) offers means
for research collaborations/discussions between participants. HCRW is
scheduled after the conference.
- The *Highlights Extended Stay Support Scheme* (*HESSS*) helps
participants find collaborators and organise visits in the vicinity of
HIGHLIGHTS.
- Highlights has now an environmental chair, Antoine Amarilli, in charge
of assessing the carbon footprint of the event.

We encourage you to attend and present your best work - be it already
published or not - at *HIGHLIGHTS'24*.
SCOPE

Representative areas include, but are not restricted to:

- Algebraic models of computation
- Algorithmic model theory
- Automata theory
- Databases
- Games for logic and verification
- Logic
- Verification

IMPORTANT DATES AND INFORMATION

- Registration to the chat of the conference at
https://highlights-conference.org/2024/zulip (no need if you did it last
year)
- HIGHLIGHTS'24 webpage: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/
- Jewels of Automata Theory'24 webpage:
https://highlights-conference.org/2024/jewels
- HCRW page: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hcrw
- HESSS page: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hesss
- Submission page:
https://openreview.net/group?id=highlights-conference.org/Highlights/2024/Conference
- Registration page:
https://framaforms.org/highlights-and-jewels-of-automata-theory-2024-1715936947
- *Registration deadline (extended)*: July 13, 2024
- Early submission deadline: April 15, 2024
- Regular submission deadline: June 17, 2024
- Conference: September 16-20, 2024.
- *Highlights' Collaborative Research Weak* (*HCRW*): September 21 - 27,
2024.

MODALITIES OF ATTENDANCE

*HIGHLIGHTS'24* is an event that will take place on-site (barring
unforeseen circumstances), and the preferred form of participation is in
person. Remote attendance via a video stream will also be offered, but with
limited possible interactions for these participants.

Submission to Highlights'24 is open to everyone, and attendance to the
conference is not a requirement. The selection procedure will not take into
account in-person attendance. Authors who do not intend to attend
Highlights'24 in-person must commit to this choice when submitting their
talk proposal. If accepted, authors of such talk proposals will have the
opportunity to share a prerecorded video of their talk, which will be made
available on the conference website.

Before coming from far away, please review how your trip and international
flights are contributing to climate change. We encourage you to take the
train as much as possible, possibly taking the opportunity for visiting
colleagues on the way and thus decomposing the travel into smaller pieces.

More generally, we encourage you to make the most of your stay. This means
extending your journey to the previous and/or following weeks for more
scientific activities in Bordeaux and around. Several initiatives are here
to help you in this task:

- You can participate in the *Highlights' Collaborative Research
Week* (*HCRW
<https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hcrw>, September 21-27*) in the
week after HIGHLIGHTS, in Bordeaux.
- You can use the *Highlights Extended Stay Support Scheme* (*HESSS
<https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hesss>*) for finding
collaborators and organising visits.

REGISTRATION

Participants to HIGHLIGHTS'24 and Jewels of Automata Theory '24 must
register before Saturday*, July 13* by completing the form in the webpage
indicated below.

*Registration page*:
https://framaforms.org/highlights-and-jewels-of-automata-theory-2024-1715936947

The registration fee for on-site attendance is 85.25 EUR. Online attendance
is free, but registration is required.
HIGHLIGHTS COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH WEAK (HCRW)

*HIGHLIGHTS'24* will be followed by the *Highlights' Collaborative Research
Week* (*HCRW*), *from September 21 to 27 (including Saturday) at the
University of Bordeaux*.

Participants to HCRW are free to organise any scientific activity they
wish. Possibilities can be to

- meet someone in particular and work together,
- organise or attend a seminar/workshop/reading group,
- gather for solving open problems,
- solicit, offer and participate in a lecture.
Working spaces will be provided on site for these activities to take
place.

We encourage participants to offer activities in advance.

- HCRW webpage: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hcrw
- If you intend to participate to HCRW, post it on the zulip stream.
- To offer or suggest activities, send your proposals to Théo Matricon:
theomatricon[at]gmail[dot]com

Confirmed workshops

- *Algebraic methods in automata theory.*
Possible topics include semigroups, decidability of classes of
languages, algebras, categories, monads, etc.
- TBA

HIGHLIGHTS EXTENDED STAY SUPPORT SCHEME (HESSS)

The *HESSS* is an incentive for collaborations between participants of the
conference and researchers working in research groups reachable by train
from the conference location. The objective is to foster interactions with
low carbon footprint. The mechanism is as follows:

- Research groups willing to participate in the scheme are listed on the
webpage: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hesss. These groups are
offering to fund collaborations between HIGHLIGHTS participants and their
members.
- The pair of a HIGHLIGHTS participant and a member of a listed research
group submit a proposal, which takes the form of an email containing names,
period of collaboration, and a sentence describing the planned activity. It
has to be sent to the *HESSS* contact person of the research unit
(better through zulip).
- The decision of acceptance is up to the research group. In particular,
it may be subject to scientific scope, number of requests, or e.g.,
favouring distant participants.
- The only strict rule is that the visit should be around HIGHLIGHTS,
and no airplane should be taken by the visitor to travel from HIGHLIGHTS to
the visit location.

INVITED TALKS Joint invited speaker

- Mikołaj Bojańczyk (University of Warsaw, Poland)

HIGHLIGHTS'24:

- Albert Atserias (Technical University of Catalonia, Spain)
- Pablo Barcelo (Universidad Católica de Chile)
- Laure Daviaud (University of East Anglia, UK)

Jewels of Automata Theory'24

- Nathanaël Fijalkow (University of Bordeaux, France)
- Artur Jeż (University of Wrocław, Poland)
- Jarkko Kari (University of Turku, Finland)
- Barbara König (University Duisburg-Essen, Germany)
- Jérôme Leroux (University of Bordeaux, France)
- Anca Muscholl (University of Bordeaux, France)
- Karin Quaas (University of Leipzig, Germany)
- Daniel Smertnig (University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)
- Tatiana Starikovskaya (ENS Paris, France)
- Wolfgang Thomas (University of Aachen, Germany)
- Marc Zeitoun (University of Bordeaux, France)
- Georg Zetzsche (MPI-SWS Kaiserslautern, Germany)

COMMITTEES PROGRAM COMMITTEE HIGHLIGHTS'24

- C. Aiswarya (Chennai Mathematical Institute, India)
- Shaull Almagor (Technion, Israel)
- Christel Baier (TU Dresden, Germany)
- Azadeh Farzan (Univ. of Toronto, Canada)
- Sam van Gool (IRIF, France)
- Ichiro Hasuo (National Institute of Informatics, Japan)
- Bartek Klin (Univ. of Oxford, UK; chair)
- Barbara König (Univ. of Duisburg-Essen, Germany)
- Karoliina Lehtinen (LIS, Aix-Marseille Univ., France)
- Anthony Widjaja Lin (TU Kaiserslautern, Germany)
- Anca Muscholl (LaBRI, Univ. Bordeaux, France)
- Ana Sokolova (Univ. of Salzburg, Austria)
- Szymon Toruńczyk (Univ. of Warsaw, Poland)
- Sophie Pinchinat (IRISA Rennes, France)

ORGANISING COMMITTEE

- Sylvain Lombardy
- Corto Mascle
- Théo Matricon
- Rémi Morvan
- Vincent Penelle
- Pierre Vandenhove

SAFETOC COUNSELOR

- Rémi Morvan

STEERING COMMITTEE

- Antoine Amarilli (environmental chair)
- León Bohn (webmaster)
- Antonio Casares (publicity chair)
- Supratik Chakraborty
- Thomas Colcombet (chair)
- Sławek Lasota
- Sophie Tison

PROGRAM COMMITTEE Jewels of Automata Theory'24

- Manfred Droste(chair)
- Jorge Almeida
- Patricia Bouyer
- Véronique Bruyère
- Thomas Colcombet
- Laurent Doyen
- Dora Giammarresi
- Juhani Karhumäki
- Bartek Klin
- Markus Lohrey
- Sylvain Lombardy
- Damian Niwiński
- Jacques Sakarovitch
- Sylvain Schmitz
- Marinella Sciortino
- Jeffrey Shallit
- Alexandra Silva
- Benjamin Steinberg

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