PhD course on “Functional Programming and Climate Impact Research”
- Current instance: end of March - May/June 2026
- Previous instance info: FPClimate 2024
This is a course aimed at PhD students or MSc students interested in the application of functional programming, domain-specific languages, and dependent types to climate impact research.
Note: This course is run as a seminar / reading course. Therefore, you must have the motivation and capacity to digest material with limited teacher presence.
The course is based on material from the following research papers:
Good background reading is provided by:
- The 2023 book ”Computing the Climate” by Steve M. Easterbrook
- The 2022 book ”Domain-Specific Languages of Mathematics” by Jansson, Ionescu, Bernardy.
The course is examined through:
- a sequence of graded hand-ins (solutions to exercises to be further specified during the course)
- active participation in most of the weekly seminars
The plan is to award 7.5 higher education credits (ECTS) upon successful completion of the course.
- BSc degree in Computer Science and Engineering or equivalent.
- Functional programming (ideally in Haskell, but other languages are also OK)
- Formal methods (ideally using dependent types, but other methods are also OK)
After completion of the course the student should be able to:
- Use functional programming specification / implementation / formalisation as a way of understanding new domains
- Understand a selection of topics in Climate Impact Research
- Effectively use Haskell and Agda for formalisation
- Master the terminology, concepts and theories associated with the selected area;
- Demonstrate deep knowledge and understanding in the area of the course, and insight into current research and development;
- Demonstrate deep methodological knowledge in the area of the course;
- Demonstrate the ability to critically and systematically integrate knowledge and to analyse, assess, and deal with complex issues in the area of the course;
- Search for, and extract, necessary information from scientific publications in the selected area of the course, with the purpose of identifying strengths and weakness of solutions, approaches and methodologies.
- The course will start in March 2026 and end in May or June.
- Room: EDIT6128 for all seminars except Thu 2026-04-02 when it is in EDIT5128.
- The seminars are usually 45min + break + 45min.
- Below is the preliminary schedule (the later meetings may depend on the participants’ schedules).
| Session | Date | Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2026-03-23 | Mon 15.15 |
| 2 | 2026-04-02 | Thu 10.00 |
| 3 | 2026-04-07 | Tue 15.15 |
| 4 | 2026-04-13 | Mon 15.15 |
| 5 | 2026-04-20 | Mon 15.15 |
| 6 | 2026-04-27 | Mon 15.15 |
| 7 | 2026-05-04 | Mon 15.15 |
| 8 | 2026-05-11 | Mon 15.15 |
| 9 | 2026-05-18 | Mon 15.15 |
| 10 | 2026-05-25 | Mon 15.15 |
| 11 | 2026-06-01 | Mon 15.15 |
| 12 | 2026-06-08 | Mon 15.15 |
- Time zone: CET (UTC+1) until end of March, then CEST (UTC+2).
- For local participants, the room is usually EDIT 6128 (at Chalmers campus Johanneberg).
- For remote participants, the zoom link is almost
https://chalmers.zoom.us/my/CUTpatrikjabut without the upper-case letters.
- If you do not need formal credits, you can just contact Patrik Jansson.
- If you want credits for your local MSc degree, contact the examiner for (DAT235/DIT577): Ana Bove
- If you want credits for your local PhD degree, obtain the approval of your supervisor and examiner, then contact Patrik Jansson.
