The needs of mission critical applications dealing with large amounts of real-world data, such as intelligent transportation systems or eHealth and eGovernment systems, are driving the continuous development of database and information system technologies. The Web and most recently Web 2.0, which emphasizes online collaboration and information sharing among users, has led to an explosion of the amount of data available for the development of new information services.

In the Center for Information and Database Systems Engineering (IDSE), we progress and extend today’s data management technologies to support the extraction and exploitation of information from real-world data. Our methods include fundamental research, system development, and empirical evaluation.

The research problems investigated in the IDSE Center originate from real-world applications, such as in eGovernment and eTourism, and are validated on data from such application domains.

IDSE Center focuses its research activities on three areas: Core Database Technologies, Temporal Database Systems and Intelligent Information Systems.

The IDSE research centre is situated in the charming town of Bozen-Bolzano in South Tyrol at the heart of the Dolomites – the pink mountains of the Alps. The nature around the city is a tourist haven for people interested in hiking in the mountains, mountain climbers, biking along the valley and in winter skiing brings millions of turists to the area. The city is trilingual between the major languages Italian and German and the minority language Ladin. Due to the large degree of tourism in the city, the majority of the population also speaks English. The colourful medieval, Gothic and Belle Époque buildings, with their stepped gables, turrets and attractively faded frescoes, have a north European feel. Yet the main commercial street feels Mediterranean, and at Piazza delle Erbe, described with pleasure by Goethe in his Italian Journey, the two flavours meet. Some of the cosiest bars and cafés are hidden behind the stalls of fruit and flowers, spices and cheeses. Bolzano is also the home of Ötzi the Iceman; found in melting glacier ice in 1991 he is one of the oldest human mummies at roughly 5000 years.