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Department of Information Science 

Introduction

History:

The Department of Information Science (School of Mathematical Sciences, Peking University) was established in 1995 as the successor of the research office of informatics, which started teaching and research work since 1971. The department began to recruit undergraduate and graduate students on information science in the seventies. Years later, in 1985, after approved by the Ministry of Education, the information science speciality was established. Since then, a large number of professionals on information and computer science have studied and started their work in this department. At present, the department has 10 faculty members, including one Changjiang scholar, two Distinguished Young scholars, and six professors. They are engaged in information processing, theoretical computer science, software formal methods, information security and other areas. The department aims to cultivate high-level specialized professionals that are proficient in both mathematical and computational theories and modern techniques on information science and computer science.


Information science is a rapidly-growing interdiscipline branch of science, of which the modern mathematical theories and methods are the most important basis. The department aims to enhance the students’ competitiveness on different areas. For example, ability on mathematical and computational thinking, as well as on applying mathematical and computational theories to solve practical problems. To achieve this goal, the department offers various courses and research directions. The course collection includes: mathematical logic, set theory and graph theory, foundation of information science, foundation of theoretical computer science, computer programming technologies and methods, digital signal processing, computer graphics, computer algebra, design and analysis of algorithms, artificial intelligence, data mining, machine learning, pattern recognition, formal methods, symbolic computation, information security, etc. And our major research directions are: image reconstruction and processing, artificial intelligence and intelligent software, program theory and software formal methods, symbolic computation, automatic reasoning and program verification, statistical learning and intelligent information processing, cryptography and information security theory, information security engineering, cyber-physical systems, etc. The department has close cooperation and exchange relations with universities and research institutes in Europe, the United States, Australia, Japan, Singapore and other places. Undergraduates and graduate students with outstanding scientific research ability can be recommended to go abroad for exchange or doctorate. Graduates can either continue their studies as masters or PhDs (on applied mathematics, signal and information processing, theoretical computer science, software engineering, financial information engineering, etc.), or be directly engaged in related areas of work. After graduation, students of this department usually serve in research departments or companies, either continue their scientific research or apply their knowledge in practical scenarios. In each area, our graduated students have outstanding performance.

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