The AntiAntiVaxxers team from the University of Oldenburg with Computing Science students Mathis Bückmann, Lea Bünting, Marius Lewrick and Alexandra Söhnitz achieved an excellent 3rd place in the informatiCup 2020. Under the supervision of Dr Dietrich Boles from the Department of Computing Science, they made it to the final of the top 4 teams from Germany, Austria and Switzerland from a total of 29 submissions, which took place completely online for the first time on 26 March 2020 due to the coronavirus crisis.
The informatiCup of the Gesellschaft für Computing Science, which took place for the 15th time in 2019/2020, is aimed at enrolled students of all semesters and all disciplines at universities and universities of applied sciences in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The competition is designed to challenge students to familiarise themselves independently with new technologies and to develop solutions to problems from the knowledge they have acquired in teamwork. Theoretical knowledge, the ability to solve problems independently and the mastery of modern software techniques are required to solve the problem. Further information on the competition can be found at https://gi.de/informaticup

The competition task of the 15th informatiCup, which started in November 2019, is now highly topical: it was about saving humanity from a pandemic. The task was to design and implement complex software that prevents the spread of fictitious pathogens in a global network of cities in a turn-based game. Dangerous diseases such as cholera, Ebola or measles require the efficient selection and effective application of possible measures, such as ordering quarantine measures, closing airports or developing vaccines to eliminate as many bacteria and viruses as possible.