SEIO and CUNEF Universidad hold the II International Workshop on Bayesian Statistics

The II International Workshop on Bayesian Statistics, organised by the Bayesian Statistics Working Group of SEIO and CUNEF Universidad, brought together more than 40 academics and researchers from around the world in Madrid to discuss and exchange perspectives on Bayesian statistics and its applications across a wide range of fields.

Designed as a single-track event, the workshop featured plenary lectures by Sylvia Frühwirth-Schnatter (WU Wien), Stefano Cabras (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid), José Miguel Hernández-Lobato (University of Cambridge), Daniel Hernández Lobato (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid), Peter Mueller (The University of Texas at Austin), David Rossell (Universidad Pompeu Fabra), and María Dolores Ugarte (Universidad Pública de Navarra).

The programme also included sessions dedicated to the presentation of research papers and provided a platform for early-career researchers to showcase their work.

Knowledge exchange

Daniel Corrales, from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and the Institute of Mathematical Sciences (ICMAT-CSIC), who attended the first edition of the workshop, believes that one of the most notable aspects of this second edition is that “the scope of Bayesian statistics has broadened, addressing not only traditional Bayesian methods but also Bayesian Machine Learning, which is currently a very hot topic.”  

Corrales was one of the early-career researchers who took advantage of the workshop to present his research on Bayesian online test-time adaptation, in which “we aim to perform a form of unsupervised fine-tuning that enables a model to detect and learn when shifts occur in the data during the testing phase or once it has been deployed in real-world environments.” His presentation provided an opportunity to gather feedback, new perspectives, and potential avenues for future research from fellow participants.

Researchers in computer science and statistics

Roi Naveiro, Professor in the Department of Quantitative Methods at CUNEF Universidad and one of the event’s main organisers, echoed Corrales’s remarks. Naveiro, who also coordinates SEIO’s Bayesian Inference Section together with Professor Remedios Sillero from the University of Seville, noted that “compared with the first edition, we have welcomed a greater number of researchers from the field of computer science, particularly those working in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, and not only from statistics. For me, this interaction between different academic communities is especially valuable.”

This second edition of the International Workshop on Bayesian Statistics once again demonstrated the ability of Bayesian statistics to adapt to emerging areas of research. In particular, its impact on Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning is now undeniable, providing the mathematical foundations needed to manage uncertainty and develop more robust predictive algorithms. In this way, the workshop continues to foster dialogue across disciplines while strengthening an increasingly diverse and international scientific community.

At CUNEF Universidad, we will continue to support initiatives such as this one, which contribute to advancing and expanding the field of statistics and quantitative methods as part of our commitment to cutting-edge research and the highest standards of teaching.