Data Science MSc

Course content

What will you study on MSc Data Science?

Your studies will focus on the intertwining areas of machine learning, visual analytics and data governance. You will investigate theoretical underpinnings while gaining practical hands-on experience. You will build on your existing knowledge and skill base to gain key understanding that will be readily applicable for a career in data science.

This course will equip you with the theoretical and algorithmic basis for understanding learning systems and the associated issues with very large datasets/data dimensionalities. You will be introduced to algorithmic approaches to learning from exemplar data and will learn the process of representing training data within appropriate feature spaces for the purposes of classification. You will also focus on basic data structures and algorithms for efficient data storage and manipulation. The major classifier types are taught before introducing the specific instances of classifiers along with appropriate training protocols. You will explore where classifiers have a relationship to statistical theory as well as notions of structural risk with respect to model fitting. You will be equipped with techniques for managing this in practical contexts.

This module provides an understanding of the methods, theories and techniques relevant to interactive visual data analysis. You will learn relevant principles and practices in visual data analysis design, implementation, and evaluation. You will gain experience in researching, designing, implementing, and evaluating your own visual analysis solutions, using both off-the-shelf tool-kits and data visualisation programming libraries. You will gain the knowledge to support your future employment or research in the fast-developing areas of data science, particularly visual analytics.

This course will provide an in-depth of the tools and systems used for mining massive dataset and, more in general, an introduction to the fascinating emerging field of Data Science. The module is divided in three parts. The first part focuses on the language R, a statistical learning language used to learn from data. This part provides an overview of the most common data mining and machine learning algorithms and every discussed concept is accompanied by illustrative examples written in R language. The second part of the module introduces the participant to MapReduce, a programming model used to process big data sets. We will teach how to design good MapReduce algorithms to process massive datasets. The third, and last, part of the module takes a tour through cloud computing systems and teaches the participant how to effectively use them.

This module focuses on legal, ethical and security requirements that underpin the technical processes and practice of data science (the collection, preparation, management, analysis and interpreting of large amounts of data called big data). Data science leads to predictive analyses and insights into big data for businesses, healthcare organisations, governments and security services among others. The volume of data collected, stored and processed brings many concerns especially related to privacy, data protection, liability, ownership and licensing of intellectual property rights and information security. This module will explore how data can be fairly and lawfully processed and protected by legal and technical means. It will give students a comprehensive understanding of important legal domains/regulatory issues, relevant ethical theories/guidance and important information security management policies that impact on the practice of data science. Further it will equip student with the necessary foundations to develop high professional standards when working as data scientists.

This project module would give the student the opportunity to use a combination of general research methods and project planning, execution, management, evaluation, reporting knowledge and skills and specialist computer science and data science knowledge and understanding to apply an existing or emerging technology to the solution of a practical problem, or to contribute and extend the theoretical understanding of new and advancing technology and its application. The project will also give students the opportunity to demonstrate a personal commitment to legal, ethical, professional standards, recognising obligations to society, the profession and the environment. You will develop your communication skills to competently communicate your findings in written and oral form.

You can find more information about this course in the programme specification. Module and programme information is indicative and may be subject to change.