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Smart Technologies

Smart technologies are changing our life and our societies on a deeper level than ever before. Smart home assistants, vehicles, factories, banks, buildings and many more are highly interconnected, communicate with their environment and with us, and operate using various levels of artificial intelligence. To shape the future, we need creative and interdisciplinary minds with knowledge of science, technology and computer science to develop, implement smart technological solutions in our modern society.

Major specialisation: Smart Technologies
Smart Technologies

The groundbreaking nature of smart technologies poses novel and complex, interdisciplinary challenges (even existential risks) that transcend science and technology. The Smart Technologies train graduates that are able to understand how novel technologies work, and at the same time are able to grasp the implication at an individual, social and economic level.

How can we integrate (nano)technology with the human body? Why is climate change such a complex issue and how can we harvest renewable energy? What is quantum computing and how could it revolutionise IT technology? In courses such as Principles of modern technology , Fields, waves and signals, and Device physics students study the concepts upon which the hardware of modern technology is based.

Software puts the “smart” in smart technologies. Having mastered Programming in Python in year 1, students in 2nd year IT courses such as Machine Learning and Big Data - Data Science, will get introduced to concepts from facial recognition and language processing via blockchain, digital security and privacy to drug design and personalised medicine.

These skills are brought together in the smart technology labs where students learn to use microcontrollers, sensors and actors and eventually build their own smart devices, such as interactive art installations or communicating robots. In the complementary projects, students apply the acquired skills in interdisciplinary teams. Liberal Arts and Sciences graduates with this specialization are ideally positioned to contribute to the development of science/technology, while keeping a close eye on the complex societal, economic and moral issues involved.

Student perspective on Smart Technologies


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Last modified:25 September 2023 2.30 p.m.