The Department of Computer Science and Technology, formerly the Computer Laboratory, is the
computer science
Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...
department of the
University of Cambridge
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
. it employed 35 academic staff, 25 support staff, 35 affiliated research staff, and about 155 research students. The current Head of Department is Professor
Ann Copestake
Ann Alicia Copestake is professor of computational linguistics and head of the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Department of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge.
...
.
History
The Department was founded as the Mathematical Laboratory under the leadership of
John Lennard-Jones
Sir John Edward Lennard-Jones (27 October 1894 – 1 November 1954) was a British mathematician and professor of theoretical physics at the University of Bristol, and then of theoretical science at the University of Cambridge. He was an imp ...
on 14 May 1937, though it did not get properly established until after
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. The new laboratory was housed in the North Wing of the former Anatomy School, on the
New Museums Site
The New Museums Site is a major site of the University of Cambridge, located on Pembroke Street, Cambridge, Pembroke Street and Free School Lane, sandwiched between Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, Pembroke College, Camb ...
. Upon its foundation, it was intended "to provide a computing service for general use, and to be a centre for the development of computational techniques in the University". The
Cambridge Diploma in Computer Science
Diploma in Computer Science, originally known as the Diploma in Numerical Analysis and Automatic Computing, was a conversion course in computer science offered by the University of Cambridge. It is equivalent to a master's degree in present-day nom ...
was the world's first postgraduate taught course in computing, starting in 1953.
In October 1946, work began under
Maurice Wilkes
Sir Maurice Vincent Wilkes (26 June 1913 – 29 November 2010) was a British computer scientist who designed and helped build the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC), one of the earliest stored program computers, and who inv ...
on
EDSAC
The Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC) was an early British computer. Inspired by John von Neumann's seminal ''First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC'', the machine was constructed by Maurice Wilkes and his team at the Universi ...
(''Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator''), which subsequently became the world's first fully operational and practical
stored program
A stored-program computer is a computer that stores program instructions in electronically or optically accessible memory. This contrasts with systems that stored the program instructions with plugboards or similar mechanisms.
The definition ...
computer when it ran its first program on 6 May 1949. It inspired the world's first business computer,
LEO. It was replaced by
EDSAC 2
EDSAC 2 was an early computer (operational in 1958), the successor to the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC). It was the first computer to have a microprogrammed control unit and a bit-slice hardware architecture.
First cal ...
, the first microcoded and bitsliced computer, in 1958.
In 1961,
David Hartley developed
Autocode
Autocode is the name of a family of "simplified coding systems", later called programming languages, devised in the 1950s and 1960s for a series of digital computers at the Universities of Manchester, Cambridge and London. Autocode was a generic ...
, one of the first
high-level programming language
In computer science, a high-level programming language is a programming language with strong Abstraction (computer science), abstraction from the details of the computer. In contrast to low-level programming languages, it may use natural language ...
s, for
EDSAC 2
EDSAC 2 was an early computer (operational in 1958), the successor to the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC). It was the first computer to have a microprogrammed control unit and a bit-slice hardware architecture.
First cal ...
. Also in that year, proposals for
Titan, based on the
Ferranti Atlas machine, were developed. Titan became fully operational in 1964 and EDSAC 2 was retired the following year. In 1967, a full ('24/7') multi-user time-shared service for up to 64 users was inaugurated on Titan.
In 1970, the Mathematical Laboratory was renamed the Computer Laboratory, with separate departments for Teaching and Research and the Computing Service, providing computing services to the university and its colleges. The two did not fully separate until 2001, when the Computer Laboratory moved out to the new William Gates building in
West Cambridge
West Cambridge is a university site to the west of Cambridge city centre in England. As part of the ''West Cambridge Master Plan'', several of the University of Cambridge's departments have relocated to the West Cambridge site from the centre ...
, off
Madingley Road
Madingley Road is a major arterial road linking central Cambridge, England with Junction 13 of the M11 motorway. It passes by West Cambridge, a major new site where some University of Cambridge departments are being relocated.
The road is desig ...
, leaving behind an independent
Computing Service.
In 2002, the Computer Laboratory launched the
Cambridge Computer Lab Ring
The Cambridge Computer Lab Ring is a members' association for staff and graduates of the Cambridge University Computer Laboratory. It was formed in 2002 as a non-profit, independent and voluntary members’ association, but was absorbed into the Ca ...
, a graduate society named after the
Cambridge Ring network.
Current
On 30 June 2017, the
Cambridge University Reporter
The ''Cambridge University Reporter'', founded in 1870, is the official journal of record of the University of Cambridge, England.
Overview
The ''Cambridge University Reporter'' appears within the University and online every Wednesday during ...
announced that the Computer Laboratory would change its name to the Department of Computer Science and Technology from 1 October 2017, to reflect the broadened scope of its purpose and activities.
The Department currently offers a 3-year undergraduate course and a 1-year masters course (with a large selection of specialised courses in various research areas). Recent research has focused on
virtualisation,
security
Security is protection from, or resilience against, potential harm (or other unwanted coercive change) caused by others, by restraining the freedom of others to act. Beneficiaries (technically referents) of security may be of persons and social ...
,
usability
Usability can be described as the capacity of a system to provide a condition for its users to perform the tasks safely, effectively, and efficiently while enjoying the experience. In software engineering, usability is the degree to which a soft ...
,
formal verification
In the context of hardware and software systems, formal verification is the act of proving or disproving the correctness of intended algorithms underlying a system with respect to a certain formal specification or property, using formal metho ...
,
formal semantics of programming languages
In programming language theory, semantics is the rigorous mathematical study of the meaning of programming languages. Semantics assigns computational meaning to valid strings in a programming language syntax.
Semantics describes the processes ...
,
computer architecture
In computer engineering, computer architecture is a description of the structure of a computer system made from component parts. It can sometimes be a high-level description that ignores details of the implementation. At a more detailed level, t ...
,
natural language processing
Natural language processing (NLP) is an interdisciplinary subfield of linguistics, computer science, and artificial intelligence concerned with the interactions between computers and human language, in particular how to program computers to pro ...
,
mobile computing
Mobile computing is human–computer interaction in which a computer is expected to be transported during normal usage, which allows for the transmission of data, voice, and video. Mobile computing involves mobile communication, mobile hardware ...
,
wireless network
A wireless network is a computer network that uses wireless data connections between network nodes.
Wireless networking is a method by which homes, telecommunications networks and business installations avoid the costly process of introducing c ...
ing,
biometric identification
Biometrics are body measurements and calculations related to human characteristics. Biometric authentication (or realistic authentication) is used in computer science as a form of identification and access control. It is also used to identify in ...
,
robotics
Robotics is an interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist humans. Robotics integrat ...
,
routing
Routing is the process of selecting a path for traffic in a network or between or across multiple networks. Broadly, routing is performed in many types of networks, including circuit-switched networks, such as the public switched telephone netw ...
,
positioning system
A positioning system is a system for determining the position of an object in space. One of the most well-known and commonly used positioning systems is the Global Positioning System (GPS).
Positioning system technologies exist ranging from worl ...
s and
sustainability
Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livi ...
(''"Computing for the future of the planet"''). Members have been involved in the creation of many successful UK
IT companies such as
Acorn
The acorn, or oaknut, is the nut of the oaks and their close relatives (genera ''Quercus'' and '' Lithocarpus'', in the family Fagaceae). It usually contains one seed (occasionally
two seeds), enclosed in a tough, leathery shell, and borne ...
,
ARM
In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
, nCipher and
XenSource
Xen (pronounced ) is a type-1 hypervisor, providing services that allow multiple computer operating systems to execute on the same computer hardware concurrently. It was
originally developed by the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory a ...
.
Staff
Professors
, the lab employed 19 professors.
Notable ones include:
#
Ross J. Anderson,
[ ] Professor of Security Engineering
#
Alan F. Blackwell, Professor of Interdisciplinary Design
#
Ann Copestake
Ann Alicia Copestake is professor of computational linguistics and head of the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Department of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge.
...
,
Professor of Computational Linguistics
#
Jon Crowcroft
Jonathan Andrew Crowcroft (born 23 November 1957) is the Marconi Professor of Communications Systems in the Department of Computer Science and Technology, University of Cambridge and the chair of the programme committee at the Alan Turing Insti ...
, Marconi Professor of Communications Systems
#
John Daugman
John Gustav Daugman is a British-American professor of computer vision and pattern recognition at the University of Cambridge. His major research contributions have been in computational neuroscience, pattern recognition, and in computer visio ...
, Professor of Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
#
Andy Hopper
Sir Andrew Hopper (born 1953) is a British-Polish Computer Technologist and entrepreneur. He is treasurer and vice-president of the Royal Society, Professor of Computer Technology, former Head of the University of Cambridge Department of Compu ...
,
[ ] Professor of Computer Technology
#
Neil Lawrence
Neil David Lawrence is the DeepMind Professor of Machine Learning at the University of Cambridge in the Department of Computer Science and Technology, senior AI fellow at the Alan Turing Institute and visiting professor at the University of Sh ...
,
Deepmind
DeepMind Technologies is a British artificial intelligence subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. and research laboratory founded in 2010. DeepMind was List of mergers and acquisitions by Google, acquired by Google in 2014 and became a wholly owned subsid ...
Professor of machine learning
#
Cecilia Mascolo
Cecilia Mascolo is a Professor of Mobile Systems at the Department of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Cambridge, and a Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge.
Education
Mascolo received her Bachelors, Masters and PhD in Compu ...
, Professor of Mobile Systems
#
Alan Mycroft
Alan Mycroft is a professor at the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Robinson College, Cambridge, where he is also director of studies for computer science.
Education
Mycroft read mathematics at Cambridge then moved ...
, Professor of Computing
#
Lawrence Paulson
Lawrence Charles Paulson (born 1955) is an American computer scientist. He is a Professor of Computational Logic at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory and a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge.
Education
Paulson graduated from the ...
, Professor of Computational Logic
#
Peter Robinson, Professor of Computer Technology
Other notable staff include
Sue Sentance,
Robert Watson,
Markus Kuhn.
Former staff
Former staff include:
*
Jean Bacon
*
James Davenport James Davenport may refer to:
*James H. Davenport (born 1953), professor of information technology at the University of Bath
*James Davenport (clergyman) (1716–1757), American clergyman from Connecticut
*James Davenport (Connecticut politician) ( ...
*
Andrew D. Gordon
Andrew D. Gordon is a British computer scientist employed by Microsoft Research. His research interests include programming language design, formal methods, concurrency, cryptography, and access control.
Biography
Gordon earned a Ph.D. from ...
*
Philip Hazel
Philip Hazel is a computer programmer best known for writing the Exim mail transport agent in 1995 and the PCRE regular expression library in 1997. He was employed by the University of Cambridge Computing Service until he retired at the end o ...
*
Robin Milner
Arthur John Robin Gorell Milner (13 January 1934 – 20 March 2010), known as Robin Milner or A. J. R. G. Milner, was a British computer scientist, and a Turing Award winner.
*
Roger Needham
Roger Michael Needham (9 February 1935 – 1 March 2003) was a British computer scientist.
Early life and education
Needham was born in Birmingham, England, the only child of Phyllis Mary, ''née'' Baker (''c''.1904–1976) and Leonard Wi ...
*
Martin Richards Martin Richards may refer to:
* Martin Richards (computer scientist) (born 1940), British computer scientist
* Martin Richards (police officer)
Martin Richards QPM (born 1959) is a British retired police officer, whose last post was as the Ch ...
*
Karen Spärck Jones
Karen Sparck Jones is a computer science researcher and innovator who pioneered the search engine algorithm known as inverse document frequency (IDF). While many early information scientists and computer engineers were focused on developing progr ...
*
David Wheeler
*
Maurice Wilkes
Sir Maurice Vincent Wilkes (26 June 1913 – 29 November 2010) was a British computer scientist who designed and helped build the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC), one of the earliest stored program computers, and who inv ...
*
Neil Wiseman
Neil Ernest Wiseman (19 May 1934 – 13 June 1995) was a British computer scientist.[Nei ...]
*
Neil Dodgson
*
Mike Gordon
Michael Eliot Gordon (born June 3, 1965) is an American bass guitarist and vocalist most recognized as a founding member of the band Phish. In addition to bass, Gordon is an accomplished banjo player, and is proficient at piano and guitar. He ...
Heads of the Computer Laboratory
The lab has been led by:
* 1949
Maurice Wilkes
Sir Maurice Vincent Wilkes (26 June 1913 – 29 November 2010) was a British computer scientist who designed and helped build the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC), one of the earliest stored program computers, and who inv ...
* 1980
Roger Needham
Roger Michael Needham (9 February 1935 – 1 March 2003) was a British computer scientist.
Early life and education
Needham was born in Birmingham, England, the only child of Phyllis Mary, ''née'' Baker (''c''.1904–1976) and Leonard Wi ...
* 1996
Robin Milner
Arthur John Robin Gorell Milner (13 January 1934 – 20 March 2010), known as Robin Milner or A. J. R. G. Milner, was a British computer scientist, and a Turing Award winner.
* 1999 Ian Leslie
* 2004
Andy Hopper
Sir Andrew Hopper (born 1953) is a British-Polish Computer Technologist and entrepreneur. He is treasurer and vice-president of the Royal Society, Professor of Computer Technology, former Head of the University of Cambridge Department of Compu ...
[
* 2018 ]Ann Copestake
Ann Alicia Copestake is professor of computational linguistics and head of the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Department of Computer Science and Technology at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge.
...
Achievements and innovations
Members have made impact in computers, Turing machines,
microprogramming, subroutines, computer networks, mobile protocols, security,
programming languages, kernels, OS, security, virtualisation, location badge
systems, etc. Below is a list.
* EDSAC
The Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC) was an early British computer. Inspired by John von Neumann's seminal ''First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC'', the machine was constructed by Maurice Wilkes and his team at the Universi ...
– world's first practical stored program electronic computer (1949–1958)
* Subroutine
In computer programming, a function or subroutine is a sequence of program instructions that performs a specific task, packaged as a unit. This unit can then be used in programs wherever that particular task should be performed.
Functions may ...
(1951)
* OXO – world's first video game (1952)
* EDSAC 2
EDSAC 2 was an early computer (operational in 1958), the successor to the Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC). It was the first computer to have a microprogrammed control unit and a bit-slice hardware architecture.
First cal ...
(1958–1965)
* Autocode
Autocode is the name of a family of "simplified coding systems", later called programming languages, devised in the 1950s and 1960s for a series of digital computers at the Universities of Manchester, Cambridge and London. Autocode was a generic ...
– one of the first high-level programming language
In computer science, a high-level programming language is a programming language with strong Abstraction (computer science), abstraction from the details of the computer. In contrast to low-level programming languages, it may use natural language ...
s (1961)
* Titan – early multi-user time-share computer (1964–1973)
* Phoenix
Phoenix most often refers to:
* Phoenix (mythology), a legendary bird from ancient Greek folklore
* Phoenix, Arizona, a city in the United States
Phoenix may also refer to:
Mythology
Greek mythological figures
* Phoenix (son of Amyntor), a ...
– IBM 370 with locally developed OS and hardware extensions (1973–1995)
* TRIPOS
At the University of Cambridge, a Tripos (, plural 'Triposes') is any of the examinations that qualify an undergraduate for a bachelor's degree or the courses taken by a student to prepare for these. For example, an undergraduate studying mathe ...
operating system – became later the basis for AmigaDOS
AmigaDOS is the disk operating system of the AmigaOS, which includes file systems, file and directory manipulation, the command-line interface, and file Redirection (computing), redirection.
In AmigaOS 1.x, AmigaDOS is based on a TRIPOS port by ...
* BCPL
BCPL ("Basic Combined Programming Language") is a procedural, imperative, and structured programming language. Originally intended for writing compilers for other languages, BCPL is no longer in common use. However, its influence is still ...
programming language – ancestor of C
* CAP computer
The Cambridge CAP computer was the first successful experimental computer that demonstrated the use of security capabilities, both in hardware and software.Levy, p.96 It was developed at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory in the 19 ...
– hardware support for capability-based security
Capability-based security is a concept in the design of secure computing systems, one of the existing security models. A capability (known in some systems as a key) is a communicable, unforgeable token of authority. It refers to a value that refe ...
* Cambridge Ring – an early local area network
A local area network (LAN) is a computer network that interconnects computers within a limited area such as a residence, school, laboratory, university campus or office building. By contrast, a wide area network (WAN) not only covers a larger ...
* Cambridge Distributed Computing System
The Cambridge Distributed Computing System is an early discontinued distributed operating system, developed in the 1980s at Cambridge University. It grew out of the Cambridge Ring The term Cambridge Ring could refer to:
* The Cambridge Ring (com ...
* Trojan Room coffee pot
The Trojan Room coffee pot was a coffee machine located in the Computer Laboratory of the University of Cambridge, England. Created in 1991 by Quentin Stafford-Fraser and Paul Jardetzky, it was migrated from their laboratory network to the we ...
– the world's first webcam
A webcam is a video camera which is designed to record or stream to a computer or computer network. They are primarily used in videotelephony, livestreaming and social media, and security. Webcams can be built-in computer hardware or peripheral d ...
(1993)
* Iris recognition
Iris recognition is an automated method of biometric identification that uses mathematical pattern-recognition techniques on video images of one or both of the irises of an individual's eyes, whose complex patterns are unique, stable, and can b ...
– biometric identification
Biometrics are body measurements and calculations related to human characteristics. Biometric authentication (or realistic authentication) is used in computer science as a form of identification and access control. It is also used to identify in ...
with vanishingly small false-accept rate
* Nemesis – real-time microkernel OS
* Active Badge System –[url="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/research/dtg/attarchive/ab.html "]
* Active Bat – ultrasonic indoor positioning system
* Xen – virtual machine monitor (2003–''present'')
* Isabelle and HOL – interactive theorem provers
Impact on business enterprise
A number of companies have been founded by staff and graduates. Their names were featured in the new entrance in 2012. Some cited examples of successful companies are ARM
In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between th ...
, Autonomy
In developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy, autonomy, from , ''autonomos'', from αὐτο- ''auto-'' "self" and νόμος ''nomos'', "law", hence when combined understood to mean "one who gives oneself one's ...
, Aveva
AVEVA Group plc is a British multinational information technology consulting company headquartered in Cambridge, England. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. The company started as the Comp ...
, CSR and Domino
Dominoes is a family of tile-based games played with gaming pieces, commonly known as dominoes. Each domino is a rectangular tile, usually with a line dividing its face into two square ''ends''. Each end is marked with a number of spots (also c ...
. One common factor they share is that key staff or founder members are "drenched in university training and research". The Cambridge Computer Lab Ring
The Cambridge Computer Lab Ring is a members' association for staff and graduates of the Cambridge University Computer Laboratory. It was formed in 2002 as a non-profit, independent and voluntary members’ association, but was absorbed into the Ca ...
was praised for its "tireless work" by Andy Hopper
Sir Andrew Hopper (born 1953) is a British-Polish Computer Technologist and entrepreneur. He is treasurer and vice-president of the Royal Society, Professor of Computer Technology, former Head of the University of Cambridge Department of Compu ...
in 2012, at its tenth anniversary dinner.
Notable alumni (industries)
* Demis Hassabis
Demis Hassabis (born 27 July 1976) is a British artificial intelligence researcher and entrepreneur. In his early career he was a video game AI programmer and designer, and an expert player of board games. He is the chief executive officer and ...
* Eben Upton
Eben Christopher Upton (born 5 April 1978) is the Welsh CEO of Raspberry Pi (Trading) Ltd., which runs the engineering and trading activities of the Raspberry Pi Foundation. He is responsible for the overall software and hardware architectur ...
* Bjarne Stroustrup
Bjarne Stroustrup (; ; born 30 December 1950) is a Danish computer scientist, most notable for the invention and development of the C++ programming language. As of July 2022, Stroustrup is a professor of Computer Science at Columbia University. ...
* John Bates
* Ian Pratt
* Simon Crosby
Simon Crosby is Co-founder and CTO of security software vendor Bromium Inc. and was a faculty member at the University of Cambridge, UK.
Career
Simon Crosby, Ph.D., is CTO at SWIM.AI, a continuous intelligence software vendor that focuses on ...
* David L Tennenhouse
* Michael Burrows
Michael Burrows, FRS (born 1963) is a British computer scientist and the creator of the Burrows–Wheeler transform, currently working for Google. Born in Britain, as of 2018 he lives in the United States, although he remains a British citizen. ...
* Andrew Herbert
Andrew James Herbert, OBE, FREng (born 1954) is a British computer scientist, formerly Chairman of Microsoft Research, for the Europe, Middle East and Africa region.
Biography
Herbert received a bachelor's of science degree in computationa ...
* Andy Harter
Andrew Charles Harter (born 1961 in Yorkshire, England) is a British computer scientist, best known as the founder of RealVNC, where he was CEO until March 2018.
Education and early life
Born in Yorkshire in 1961, Harter attended the Queen E ...
* Andy Hopper
Sir Andrew Hopper (born 1953) is a British-Polish Computer Technologist and entrepreneur. He is treasurer and vice-president of the Royal Society, Professor of Computer Technology, former Head of the University of Cambridge Department of Compu ...
References
{{Authority control
Cambridge Computer Laboratory
The Department of Computer Science and Technology, formerly the Computer Laboratory, is the computer science department of the University of Cambridge. it employed 35 academic staff, 25 support staff, 35 affiliated research staff, and about 15 ...
Cambridge Computer Laboratory
The Department of Computer Science and Technology, formerly the Computer Laboratory, is the computer science department of the University of Cambridge. it employed 35 academic staff, 25 support staff, 35 affiliated research staff, and about 15 ...
Computer Science and Technology, Department of
Computer Science and Technology, Department of
History of computing in the United Kingdom
Cambridge Computer Laboratory
The Department of Computer Science and Technology, formerly the Computer Laboratory, is the computer science department of the University of Cambridge. it employed 35 academic staff, 25 support staff, 35 affiliated research staff, and about 15 ...