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Informatics

RESEARCH IN INFORMATION SYSTEMS

Hands at a laptop, with graphics added on top. Collage.
Photo: Istock/Chainarong Prasertthai

Our research mission is to create relevant and rigorous knowledge on how digitalisation is designed and how it influences individuals, organisations and society.

Research in Information Systems (Informatics) in Lund focuses on designing digitalisation and on the digital transformation of society and human activities. How do we contribute to this transformation as designers and developers? How are individuals, groups and organisations affected by digital transformation?

Our research is interdisciplinary in its approach and has a strong international focus in terms of research issues and general involvement. Researchers and doctoral students make an important contribution to the research at the department and to the intellectual life of the School. We participate in national and international research collaboration such as research projects. We publish our research in highly ranked, peer reviewed conferences and journals in information systems and adjacent fields. Researchers at the department also participate in the popular science debate and collaborate with practitioners in several areas.

Information systems

Information systems (IS) is a bridge between technology and human activities.

In an international context, the discipline of information systems is defined as “the effective design, delivery, use and impact of information [and communication] technologies in organisations and society.” (Avison & Fitzgerald, 2003).

The Swedish university network organisation Svenska Informationssystemakademin, defines the discipline as (own translation):

Information systems/informatics is the scientific subject that develops knowledge about digitalisation and its prerequisites, significance, values and consequences in individual, organisational and societal contexts. The discipline includes studies and development of digital practices, resources, artifacts and systems. Digital practices include management, design, implementation and use of digital resources, artifacts and systems.

This means that the study of digitalisation and digital transformation within the discipline of information systems is always performed in a human context.

Digital transformation

The research at the department focuses broadly on digital transformation and includes both the process of this transformation and its impact on users and society. Some of the specific topics of research are:

Decision automation and decision support systems, Green and sustainable IS and smart cities, artificial intelligence and human-AI hybrids, information security and privacy, the sharing economy, mobile solutions, eGovernment, online learning, implications and design of IT in healthcare, and both the instrumental and humanistic outcomes resulting from global IT work.

Research results from the Department of Informatics have been applied in e.g. health services, crisis management, child health care solutions and banking. These solutions have been put into use at national and international levels, spanning across supporting municipalities to the European Union and specific developing countries.

Research projects

A selection of our current or recent research projects.

An Interreg project, in the area Fyrbodal in Sweden and Østfold in Norway, for organising, introducing and using welfare technology in health care. The goal is to strengthen the innovative capacity of the municipalities in the region in collaboration with universities and software companies. The overriding aim of the project is to develop and use welfare technologies to strengthen the care of vulnerable elderly.

Contact: Christina Keller

eTeam on hv.se (in Swedish)

A Smart City idea that explores the opportunities for urban systems and citizens’ quality of life. Europe today is a laboratory of distributed experimentation targeting sustainable innovation and new development models. The European Union has identified Smart Cities and Industry 4.0 as the two key strategies of these efforts. The two strategies share the idea that high technologies and digitalisation put us at the edge of a new world of opportunities; the Industry 4.0 idea explores the many opportunities for business.

Contact: Paul Pierce

The project in the Research Portal

A multidisciplinary research project focusing on the transformation of the global security industry, with emphasis on the shift from analogue to digital technology platforms, and its consequences for corporate strategy, global demand and supply, market expansion and organisational management.

Contact: Benjamin Weaver and Markus Lahtinen

The project in the Research Portal

Towards the next generation of secure societies – The impact of personalised services on surveillance capitalism.

Cyber-crime is on the rise and it is not surprising that one of the key UN missions is to address the issue of citizens safety and security through sustainable development in its 2030 agenda.

This project focuses on understanding cyber-risks from the perspective of the dialectic tension of free digital service and the loss of privacy. We present this as a dilemma with the intention to develop a theoretical and an empirical contribution envisioned to produce results that can be helpful to science and industry equally.

The project is intended to run in collaboration between three universities: Lund University in partnership with The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, and Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), Manchester, UK.

Contact: Miranda Kajtazi

The decision support system S-HELP brings major benefits to emergency healthcare management in Europe, from learning and preparing for emergency incidents and analysing threats, to post-evaluation, reporting and logistics management. It provides a unique mechanism to assist stakeholders and end users to work together for coordinated, effective, evidence-based decisions at all stages of emergency management (EM). It therefore plays an essential role in the response to emergencies that in many cases have negative impact on human health.

Contact: Odd Steen and Nicklas Holmberg

Provides local health surveillance assistants in Malawi with an electronic IMCI (e-IMCI) application based on mobile phones. It can be used to improve the assessment, diagnosis and treatment of seriously ill children with infectious diseases and to circumvent the absence of healthcare infrastructures.

Contact: Sven Carlsson

A digital service providing unique vaccination recommendations based on vaccination schemas according to Swedish standards, independent of the country or countries where previous vaccinations have been given to a child. The service itself will be used by physicians in many healthcare sectors. Coordination is based on the rules used by each country included in the IS service knowledge base, containing vaccination schemas, regulations and instructions on different vaccines.

Contact: Odd Steen

Contact

Nicklas Holmberg
Head of the Department of Informatics

Contact

Christina Keller
Professor, director of third cycle studies