BFTA 2025

7th School on Belief Functions and their Applications, Oct 19-23, Granada, Spain.

News

News

Registrations are now open

The Programme is available

The School


The BELIEF school is a biennial event organized by the Belief Functions and Applications Society (BFAS) that offers a unique opportunity for students and researchers to learn about fundamental and advanced aspects of the theory of belief functions (also referred to as Dempster-Shafer theory, or evidence theory), a formalism for reasoning with uncertainty.

The school will be organized around a set of lectures by prominent researchers. Lectures will gradually tackle basic to more advanced theoretical concepts. They will also highlight the links with other uncertainty theories such as random sets and possibility theory, and present applications of belief functions in various domains including machine learning, information fusion, statistical inference and materials science.

Important dates

  • 15 April 2025: Registration opens
  • 5 July 2025: Deadline for BFAS grant application
  • 15 July 2025: Deadline for early-bird registration
  • 15 September 2025: Deadline for registration

Fees

Registration fees for on-site participants include tuition fees, lunches, coffee breaks and the social event.

  • Students 200€ (early-bird) / 250€
  • Regular 300€ (early-bird) / 350€
  • Online 50€
  • ISIF members can ask for a 50% discount on the registration fee.

Call for Posters

BFAS school participants will have the opportunity to present their ongoing work during a poster session. Interested participants, please submit your poster title, author names together with an abstract of roughly 500 words using the registration form (send it to bfta2025@bfasociety.org).

Financial support

The Belief Functions and Applications Society (BFAS) and the journal of Artificial Intelligence (Elsevier) are offering several grants that cover the school registration fees. An additional amount may also be granted to cover part of the travel or accommodation, depending on individual circumstances. Candidates must be PhD students or early career researchers (i.e., PhD obtained less than 3 years ago). Candidates can apply by sending the following information:

  • CV
  • Student proof (for PhD students)
  • Recommendation letter from supervisor (for PhD students) / from senior researcher (for early career researchers)

to: bfta2025@bfasociety.org, with copy to the secretary of BFAS at secretary@bfasociety.org and aljdrdc@gmail.com.

The deadline for applications is 5 July 2025.


BFTA 2025 Flyer

Programme

  • Sunday, 19 October 2025
  • 13:00 – 14:30: Registration and Lunch
  • 14:30 - 16:00: Lecture 1 "Introduction to the theory of belief functions", Frédéric Pichon, University of Artois, France.
  • 16:00 – 16:30: Coffee break
  • 16:30 – 18:00: Lecture 2 "Uncertainty, conflict and distance measures in evidence theory", Anne-Laure Jousselme, CS Group research lab, France.
  • Monday, 20 October 2025
  • 09:30 - 11:00: Lecture 3 "Correction and fusion of belief functions", Frédéric Pichon, University of Artois, France.
  • 11:00 – 11:30: Coffee break
  • 11:30 - 13:00: Lecture 4 "Graphical belief function models: theory, computation and applications", Prakash Shenoy, School of Business, University of Kansas, USA.
  • 13:00 – 14:30: Lunch
  • 14:30 - 16:00: Lecture 5 "Approximation of belief functions", Serafín Moral, Universidad de Granada, Spain.
  • 16:00 – 17:15: Coffee break and Poster Discussion
  • 17:15 – 18:00: BFAS Meeting
  • Tuesday, 21 October 2025
  • 09:30 - 11:00: Lecture 6 "Imprecise probabilities and belief functions", Enrique Miranda, Universidad de Oviedo, Spain.
  • 11:00 - 11:30: Coffee break
  • 11:30 - 13:00: Lecture 7 "Random sets and random fuzzy sets", Inés Couso, Universidad de Oviedo, Spain.
  • 13:00 – 14:30: Lunch
  • Afternoon: Visit to Alhambra
  • Wednesday, 22 October 2025
  • 09:30 - 11:00: Lecture 8 "Decision under uncertainty with belief functions", Sébastien Destercke, Université de Technologie de Compiègne, France.
  • 11:00 - 11:30: Coffee break
  • 11:30 - 13:00: Lecture 9 "Random fuzzy sets II", Thierry Denœux, Université de Technologie de Compiègne, France.
  • 13:00 – 14:30: Lunch
  • 14:30 - 16:00: Lecture 10 "Statistical inference and belief function", Ryan Martin, North Carolina State University, USA.
  • 16:00 – 17:15: Coffee break and Poster Discussion
  • Thursday, 23 October 2025
  • 09:30 - 11:00: Lecture 11 "Evidential machine learning", Thierry Denœux, Université de Technologie de Compiègne, France.
  • 11:00 - 11:30: Coffee break
  • 11:30 - 13:00: Panel discussion and closing
  • 13:00 – 14:30: Lunch

Venue

The school will take place in the Carmen de la Victoria Residence, University of Granada

Carmen de la Victoria is a guest residence located on the Albayzín hill, a place where there are Carmenes since the Arab period. Its shape was established at the end of the 19th century, when the primitive Carmen de la Victoria, known as Carmen Olivarillo, and Carmen Percal, on both sides of the Arab wall of the Cuesta del Chapiz, were unified.

Carmenes are typical estates of the historic quarters of Granada, heirs of the orchards of delight that had the Arabs Granada in the contours of the city. Today they are home gardens that maintain an old tradition of pleasurable retirement for their owners.

Carmen de la Victoria guest residence picture

Address

Cta. del Chapiz, 9, Albaicín, 18010 Granada, Spain

How to travel to Granada

Granada has an airport located 20 Km from the city, but there are very few international flights (currently only Paris and not every day). Probably, if you travel to Granada you would need to go through Madrid or Barcelona.

Another interesting possibility is to travel to Málaga airport. Málaga has direct connections with the main cities in Europe and the fares are usually cheap. There is a bus from the airport to Granada running every 1 or 2 hours. It is also possible to travel from Málaga to Granada by train.

If you travel to Madrid, there are direct buses from Madrid airport to Granada, but the distance is high (5 hours approximately). Madrid is also connected to Granada with a high speed train that takes 3 hours and 20 minutes.

Accommodation

We offer the following possibilities for staying in Granada during the school:

Room rates per day in university residences are as follows:

Lunches at the Carmen de la Victoria are always included for everybody with the registration.

For a double or triple room only one of the persons staying should make the reservation.

It is possible to make a reservation by using the registration form or by sending a message to the school email: bfta2025@bfasociety.org.

Payment will be required in advance before 30 September 2025.

Registration


Participants have two options to attend the school: either onsite or online.

The registration fee for the onsite participants covers the following items:

  • Tuition,
  • Lunches,
  • Coffee breaks,
  • Social event,
  • Membership to BFAS.

Please download, fill and return the registration form with your proof of payment to bfta2025@bfasociety.org.

The registration procedure described here is the only one valid. Please, do not follow any other suggestion which does not come from the organising committee.

Organising and Programme Committee

  • Serafin Moral, University of Granada, Spain
  • Ines Couso, University of Oviedo, Spain
  • Enrique Miranda, University of Oviedo, Spain
  • Thierry Denœux, University of Technology of Compiègne, France
  • Anne-Laure Jousselme, CS Group Research Lab, France
  • Fréderic Pichon, Artois University, France
  • David Mercier, Artois University, France