Highlights 2024 : Highlights of Logic, Games and Automata

CALL FOR PRESENTATIONS AND PARTICIPATION TO HIGHLIGHTS’24, AUTOMATHA’24,
AND HCRW (Bordeaux, France, 16-20 September 2024)

*HIGHLIGHTS’24* and *AUTOMATHA’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.

*AUTOMATHA’24* will be the second AutoMathA conference, after the one
organised in 2015, which was itself the continuation of a European research
project that terminated in 2010. The conference AutoMathA 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 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.
- It is colocated with AUTOMATHA’24, 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/
- HCRW page: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hcrw
- HESSS page: https://highlights-conference.org/2024/hesss
- Submission page: TBA
- Registration page: TBA
- Early submission deadline: April 15, 2024
- Early notification: April 26, 2024
- Regular submission deadline: June 17, 2024
- Regular notification: June 28, 2024
- Conference: September 16-20, 2024.
- *Highlights’ Collaborative Research Weak* (*HCRW*): September 21 - 27,
2024.

INVITED TALKS

To be announced.
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.

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.

[EARLY] SUBMISSIONS AND GUIDELINES

Submissions should take the form of a short abstract describing the content
of the presentation and its interest. It should serve as a proposal for a
presentation. Hence, submissions should have a single author — the speaker.
They can concern any recently published, to be published, or ongoing work
of the speaker. We expect you to present your favourite result of the year,
so there should be at most one submission per speaker. The abstract should
list co-authors, if any. Optionally, an extended abstract of up to two
pages may be attached as a PDF file.

We encourage both young and senior researchers to present.

The *early round of submissions is open until Monday, April 15*. By
submitting before this deadline, you will profit from an *early
notification by April 26* which may help you in organising your journey.
The *regular submission deadline is Monday, June 16*, with a *notification
by June 28*.

Submissions will not lead to publications. There are no formal proceedings
and we encourage the presentation of work published or presented elsewhere.

The talk (which is short, around 10 minutes) can be doubled with a poster.
Further information about poster submissions will be provided.

*The submission page will be announced soon*

HIGHLIGHTS’ COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH WEEK (HCRW)

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

Participants to HCRW are free to organise any scientific activity they
wish. It is up to you to decide what this week should be. 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 register and 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 suggest or solicit activities: post your proposals on the
dedicated zulip stream.

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/will be
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.
- Research groups interested in participating in the program should
contact Thomas Colcombet (through Zulip).

COMMITTEES PROGRAM COMMITTEE

- 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

- Vincent Penelle
- Rémi Morvan
- Corto Mascle
- Théo Matricon
- 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