The first CNSP Hackathon will take place in Maastricht, Netherlands on September 12-14, 2025, just before the International Conference on Auditory Cortex (ICAC). Put your coding skills to the test and solve real problems in natural sensory processing.

During the CNSP Hackathon, you'll collaborate in teams to develop innovative tools and analyses that advance research in cognition and natural sensory processing. Whether you're interested in neural signal processing, data visualization, or building open-source resources, this hands-on event offers a unique opportunity to contribute to the CNSP community.

Only 20 spots are available, so register early to secure your spot!

We are now accepting applications to the first CNSP Hackathon!

• Complete your registration here: HACKATHON REGISTRATION FORM

Important dates:

• Applications open - 25 April 2025
• Early bird registrations close - 31 May 2025
• Notifications of acceptance for early bird registrations - 7 June 2025
• Regular registrations close - 30 June 2025
• Notifications of acceptance for regular registrations - 7 July 2025

Project preparations and teaming up will take place during the Summer to get you ready for the hackathon.

Registration fees:

• Early bird registration: €100
• Standard registration: €130
• Registration fee cover access to data, tools & materials (including Matlab license for the duration of the workshop) and tea & coffee
• Each particpant is responsible for their own travel and accommodation arrangements.

We will award two fee waivers & travel grants of €250 each funded by Artinis Medical Systems. Applicants are encouraged to indicate any financial need in their application.

Hackathon dates and schedule:

• 12/09 (Friday): Project introductions and group work
• 13/09 (Saturday): Project group work
• 14/09 (Sunday – morning only): Project presentations

Location:The Social Hub, Sphinxcour 9A, Maastricht, NL.

What will happen at the Hackathon:

The hackathon will start with a presentation of the challenges, and participants will then join one of the workgroups. The hackathon will involve sessions for interacting within and also between worksgroups to solve exciting challenges in creative ways. We will tackle challenges in the following areas:

• fNIRS hyperscanning (data collection and basic analysis challenge). We will collect the first speech listening fNIRS hyperscanning dataset using the Artinis Brite Ultra devices, the world-only system able to seamlessly sync up to 30 devices! All participants will get a chance to try the system, and a specific workgroup will define the first end-to-end processing pipeline.
• Simultaneous EEG dialogue (data analysis challenge). EEG data will be provided where pairs of participants (dyads) engaged in conversations. The challenge will involve analysing this data to probe the hierarchical processing of speech.
• Stimulus feature extraction challenge. Feature extraction often differs across different research teams. Here, we will combine the growing CNSP dataset collection with the various processing pipelines from the participants to determine the most effective way of studying speech/music processing.
• Other challenges may involve data analysis, decoding, or taking advantage of the growing dataset collection available in the CNSP resources. An online brainstorming session will be organised before the hackathon. Starting from these topic areas, we will identify together specific challenges and tasks that are tailored to the participants interests and goal.

Who is eligible to apply?

• Researchers studying natural speech or music perception with EEG/MEG/ECoG who have some experience with or interest in ecologically-valid experiments.
• Researchers with experience in continuous sensory perception and tools such as the mTRF-Toolbox or Eelbrain, who are interested in finding new ways of analysing data and developing new tools.
• Researchers with programming experience in Matlab, Python or other programming languages, open source software development and advance neural data analysis.
• A practical interest in applying their knowledge and skills into practice.