Wisconsin Institute for Discovery

SoundWaves: Astronomical Scale
2026-04-24 19:30 - 21:00 (America/Chicago) | Hamel Music Center, 740 University Avenue, Madison, WI, 53706, United States
This academic year, SoundWaves is exploring scales. In this final edition, we will be zooming WAY out to the Astronomical scale!

SoundWaves combines scientific lectures about the world with live classical music performances. Each event revolves around a theme, exploring it first from many scientific angles and then through the lens of music. The program starts and concludes with a live performance of music related to the evening’s theme.

On April 24, 2026, SoundWaves wraps up the academic year of exploration of scale with Astronomical Scale. How can we understand the hugeness of the universe? How do we build the robotics to explore the universe? How did the ancients view the universe? And we’ll hear the out-of-this-world sounds of many French horns playing together.

The Art of Memory: A Conversation with Dale M. Kushner and Viviane Silvera
2026-04-23 17:00 - 18:00 | Auditorium, Chazen Museum of Art
Join novelist and poet Dale M. Kushner and filmmaker and artist Viviane Silvera for a conversation exploring the intersections of storytelling, neuroscience, and visual art. Centered around Silvera’s film See Memory—composed of over 30,000 hand-painted frames—the conversation will be moderated by Michelle Wildgen, author and Writer-in-Residence at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery.
CONTACT: 263-2246, events@chazen.wisc.edu
URL: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-art-of-memory-a-conversation-with-dale-m-kushner-and-viviane-silvera-tickets-1986432815023?aff=TOev04232026

Crossroads of Ideas: Memory in Motion
2026-04-22 19:00 - 20:00 | Discovery Building, 330 North Orchard Street, De Luca Forum, Madison, WI, 53715, United States
Art, Science, and the Living Nature of Memory- featuring Viviane Silveras, John Yin, and hosted by Guy Thorne.

In this Crossroads of Ideas conversation, we explore the dynamic life of memory through the artistic lenses of film and painting alongside the analytical lens of science. Featuring Viviane Silvera, the University of Wisconsin–Madison Division of the Arts 2026 Artist in Residence, the event highlights her 2025 Telly Award winning film See Memory which invites audiences to visualize a reality where abstraction, emotion, and evolving ideas converge. Created from more than 30,000 hand-painted stills, See Memory weaves together cutting-edge research and deeply personal storytelling to illuminate how memory works and how it can be reframed.
Moderated by WID researcher, Dr. John Yin, the discussion brings together creative practice and scientific inquiry revealing deeper perspectives on emotion, experience, and the mind itself. Through moving images and thoughtful dialogue, we will consider memory not as something fixed, but as a living process that is continually shaped by how we sense, interpret, and imagine.

Watch Viviane’s film, See Memory, ahead of our Crossroads of Ideas discussion here: https://www.pbs.org/show/see-memory/. While not required, viewing the film will add a wonderful layer of understanding to this event.

Indigenous Language Table
2026-04-22 13:00 - 14:15, 2026-04-15 13:00 - 14:15, 2026-04-08 13:00 - 14:15, 2026-03-25 13:00 - 14:15, 2026-03-18 13:00 - 14:15, 2026-03-11 13:00 - 14:15 | 1145 Discovery Building
A safe place to practice indigneous languages. An Indigenous Language Table supports learners in developing spoken skills beyond the classroom, building community, strengthening purpose, and normalizing Indigenous languages through representation. It welcomes former students and ongoing learners, community members from classes or self study, and anyone interested in Indigenous languages and people.
CONTACT: 316-4325, lredeagle@wisc.edu
URL: https://illuminatingdiscovery.wisc.edu/indigenous-language-table/

WID Seminar Series:
2026-04-21 13:00 - 14:30 | Discovery Building, 330 North Orchard Street, De Luca Forum, Madison, WI, 53715, United States
Modeling parasite life cycles in mice and microfluidic devices

WID Seminar Series: ‘Modeling parasite life cycles in mice and microfluidic devices’ presented by Laura Knoll and introduced by Elebeoba (Chi-Chi) May. April 21 at 1pm in the Orchard View Room, Discovery Building. Light refreshments served. Free and open to the public.

CANCELLED: WID Seminar Series: Modeling Parasite Life Cycles in Mice and Microfluidic Devices
2026-04-21 13:00 - 14:15 | Orchard View Room 3280, Discovery Building (Also offered online)
Laura Knoll, with introduction by Elebeoba “Chi-Chi” May.
CONTACT: media@wid.wisc.edu
URL: https://wid.wisc.edu/all-events/wid-seminar-series/
ONLINE: https://uwmadison.zoom.us/j/98293855424

2026 Data Science Research Bazaar
2026-04-16 10:00 - 11:30, 2026-04-06 13:00 - 16:00, 2026-04-06 09:00 - 12:00, 2026-03-23 14:00 - 17:00, 2026-03-23 09:00 - 10:30, 2026-03-19 09:00 - 16:30 | Discovery Building, 330 North Orchard Street, De Luca Forum, Madison, WI, 53715, United States
The Data Science Research Bazaar brings together researchers from diverse fields who use data, computing, and software in their work.

Open Source in Drug Discovery and Molecular Design
2026-04-14 15:00 - 16:00 | Orchard View Room, Discovery Building
CONTACT: 815-383-3279, sarah.stevens@wisc.edu
URL: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdJ5HjYMtIhP5gsz7PMSOlKq4bKglRkBJ3SGJSedMonAGvskg/viewform

ML+Coffee
2026-04-08 09:00 - 11:00 | 1145 Discovery Building
ML+X Networking & Coworking.
CONTACT: endemann@wisc.edu
URL: https://forms.gle/dHavKeyBTt5TgXKC8

ML+X Forum
2026-04-07 12:00 - 13:00 | Orchard View Room, Discovery Building (Also offered online)
ML+X Forum.
CONTACT: endemann@wisc.edu
ONLINE: https://uwmadison.zoom.us/j/92639425571?pwd=[REDACTED]

Building Better Research Software in R
2026-04-02 09:00 - 13:00, 2026-04-01 09:00 - 13:00, 2026-03-31 09:00 - 13:00, 2026-03-30 09:00 - 13:00 | Orchard View Room, Discovery Building
Building Better Research Software in R is a pilot workshop. We will be teaching next steps for doing software development as a researcher, after learning R, the Unix shell, and git/GitHub. This workshop includes how to create a project, project reproducible environment, test your software, work with collaborators, write documentation, and more!
CONTACT: facilitator@datascience.wisc.edu
URL: https://uw-madison-datascience.github.io/2026-03-30-uwmadison-bbrsr/

Running Pytorch on CHTC
2026-03-25 13:00 - 14:30 | 3610 Morgridge Hall
Transition your Pytorch workflow to CHTC systems. Pytorch is a growing, popular software for machine-learning based workflows. This training is aimed towards researchers who have experience running Pytorch, but need to scale up their workflow from their local computers to larger computing systems. A CHTC account is recommended.
Visit the event page for more details.
CONTACT: chtc@cs.wisc.edu
URL: https://chtc.cs.wisc.edu/events/2026/03/25/pytorch

Crossroads of Ideas: When Antibiotics Fail
2026-03-18 19:00 - 20:00 | Discovery Building, 330 North Orchard Street, De Luca Forum, Madison, WI, 53715, United States
Part 3 in the productive failure miniseries!

How do we manage when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites no longer respond to antimicrobial medicines? What are our options? WID’s Marc Chevrette and Tiny Earth’s Sarah Miller discuss lifesaving drugs: how they are discovered & what we can do to keep them potent.

WID Seminar Series:
2026-03-17 13:00 - 14:00 | Discovery Building, 330 North Orchard Street, De Luca Forum, Madison, WI, 53715, United States
University Driven Entrepreneurship

Remote option available

NVIDIA GTC 2026 Keynote Watch Party
2026-03-16 12:30 - 15:30 | DeLuca Forum, Discovery Building, 330 N. Orchard Street, Madison, United States
ML+X Event.
CONTACT: endemann@wisc.edu
URL: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd9km7LWDCnRhjcLGsjlb-3fPC7NQFj3V5A9QV2MYRQtpviiw/viewform

ML+Coffee — Coding Agents and More
2026-03-11 09:00 - 11:00 | 1145 Discovery Building

Weak Supervision Facilitates Mapping Wealth and Population Using Historical Aerial Photographs
2026-03-10 12:00 - 13:00 | Orchard View Room, Discovery Building (Also offered online)
