Projects
Artcast4D: Unleashing creativity! Advances in immersive technology are an important driver of the experience economy, enhancing the breadth, depth and intensity of the visiting experience at arts and cultural institutions. Yet, they usually are neither readily available nor broadly accessible. First, they require specific developments that can hardly be carried out by most institutions. Second, the inherent affordance of immersive propositions is questioned by the currently evolving world health situation. The objective of the Artcast4D project is to develop a technological framework and tools that will unleash the potential of EU CCIs for designing and developing cost-effective, non-invasive, immersive and...
Improved Science-Based Maritime Spatial Planning to Safeguard and Restore Biodiversity in a coherent European MPA network With an overall aim to support the coherent implementation of the EU (European Union) Biodiversity Strategy (EUBS) 2030, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) post-2020 framework, as well as the EU Green Deal, MSP4BIO develops and demonstrates the ways in which knowledge-based MSP becomes a vehicle and a tool for the protection and recovery of ecosystems. Specifically, MSP4BIO will develop an integrated flexible socio-ecological management to cope with a rapidly changing environment for coastal, offshore, and deep-sea ecosystems and validate its concrete applicability in...
Science for Evidence-based and sustainabLe decIsions about NAtural capital The importance of biodiversity (BD) and healthy ecosystems and the services they deliver has increasingly been acknowledged. Policy initiatives, such as the EU BD Strategies 2020 and 2030, IPBES, IPCC and CBD were launched to address BD, natural capital and related values. Research has created a knowledge base to better understand nature-human interactions that are at the base of ecosystem services (ES) delivery. The key aim of related actions is to provide robust information that can be harnessed to support protection, restoration and sustainable as well as climate-neutral use of ecosystems...
Improved transdisciplinary science for effective ecosystem-based maritime spatial planning and conservation in European Seas (MarinePlan) One of today's most pressing challenges is to safeguard the loss of ecosystem biodiversity and functioning, while simultaneously allowing for their exploitation by those who depend on their services, goods and benefits. In Europe, Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) is the main governance process to ideally integrate sustainability and exploitation. This requires tools and knowledge to align MSP and marine protected area (MPA) designation processes, which are lacking particularly regarding transboundary coordination and connectivity. Founded on a large amount of expertise and a solid theoretical basis,...
ASSESSMENT AND ENGINEERING OF EQUITABLE, UNBIASED, IMPARTIAL AND TRUSTWORTHY AI SYSTEMS AI-based decision support systems are increasingly deployed in industry, in the public and private sectors, and in policy-making. As our society is facing a dramatic increase in inequalities and intersectional discrimination, we need to prevent AI systems to amplify this phenomenon but rather mitigate it. To trust these systems, domain experts and stakeholders need to trust the decisions.Fairness stands as one of the main principles of Trustworthy AI promoted at EU level. How these principles, in particular fairness, translate into technical, functional social, and lawful requirements in the AI...
Temporal Evolution of the Milky-way Properties from an Observational and theoretical Sinergy Understanding how galaxies form and evolve in the Universe is a key, long-term goal of Astrophysics. In this regard, our Galaxy provides unique insights because, due to its proximity, detailed galactic properties can be resolved that can unravel its formation history. For this reason, the international community and in particular European countries have made large investments in observational resources to perform Galactic research during this and the following decades (for example the Gaia mission and a number of ambitious spectroscopic surveys like WEAVE and 4MOST, among others). The...
Biological Upgrading of Brewer Spent Grain into high added value products Brewer’s spent grain (BSG) is an agro-industrial by-product produced from breweries (~20 kg BSG/hlbeer). Its annual global production is estimated to be 39 million tons, with 3.4 million tons produced in the European Union. Most BSG is currently used as a low-value animal feed (35€/ton). In this context, BSG represents a promising feedstock for the production of novel added-value biomolecules. Indeed, this lignocellulosic material is composed of polyphenolic macromolecules such as ferulic (FA) and p-coumaric acids (PA), which have very important physiological functions and a market price of ~...
Place-based innovation of cultural and creative industries in non-urban areas The IN SITU project combines research and experimental actions to advance the innovation-related practices, capacities, and potential of CCIs based in non-urban areas of the EU, a constituency of the CCI sector that has grown in visibility and significance over the last decade in Europe and internationally but which is still vulnerable due to the lagging attention of research and policy to its needs, characteristics, and potentials. The project aims to advance understanding of the forms, processes, and governance of innovation involving cultural and creative industries (CCIs) located in non-urban...
PLOCAN Tested Optimised Floating Ocean Thermal Eenergy Conversion Platform The overall objective for the project is to achieve a successful demonstration of the novel designs and materials for an ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) platform capable of converting solar heat energy stored in the oceans surrounding the Overseas Countries and Territories of the EU, Small Islands and Developing States, and the Asian and African continent into reliable, baseload power with an economical cost model. The following objectives have been identified:Technical Specification: Design prototype components using circular materials and computational Modelling tools (Predictive Modelling tools developed and/or refined) Research Material Properties...
New Copernicus capability for trophic ocean networks The ocean’s biodiversity supports the livelihoods of over three billion people, providing vital services, including food and nutrient cycling. However marine policy and resource management do not yet consider the latest scientific advances, even when the state-of-the-art operational models of the European Copernicus Marine Service (CMEMS) are used.Our objective is to enable CMEMS to deliver novel products that inform marine biodiversity conservation and food resources management, by fusing new data into innovative ecosystem models that integrate biological and abiotic components, habitats, and stressors of marine ecosystems.NECCTON will inter-link new models in the CMEMS...
European Twinning for research in Solar energy to (2) water (H2O) production and treatment technologies While the largest resource to avail is saline water, desalination faces two main challenges to its sustainability: the energy consumption required for the process and the waste residual brine, that can have a serious environmental impacts. Whereas the combination of Solar PV with Reverse Osmosis or Solar Thermal heat with Distillation processes has been developed along the recent decades into commercially available solar desalination solutions, the innovative integration of brine valorization and zero liquid discharge (ZLD) concepts aims at developing strategies to close the material...
Diabetes, obesity and the Kidney Chronic kidney disease is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the EU. About 10-15% of the EU population has chronic kidney disease (CKD) and this number is expected to increase in the future decades. Diabetes is today the main cause of CKD in the EU: about, 30% of the cases with dialysis treatment in the EU have diabetes. Also, we are facing a pandemic of overweight and obesity in the EU. Overweight and obesity are increasing at a rapid rate in most of the EU Member States, with estimates indicating that of 52.7...
Operator-Centered Enhancement of Awareness in Navigation The OCEAN project approach is to contribute to the mitigation of navigational accidents by supporting the navigators to do an even better job than they do presently. Such support does not only relate to an ‘on-the-spot’ enhancement of navigational awareness – including the presence of marine mammals and floating containers – or an improved performance of evasive manoeuvring and other mitigating actions. The project will go both deeper and wider, to identify and suggest amendments or improvements in the most pertinent factors that may contribute to events becoming accidents: training, technical, human or organisational...
Support to SET Plan Implementation Working Group and European Technology and Innovation Platform for Ocean Energy SEETIP Ocean’s mission is to enhance cooperation and collaboration amongst stakeholders both inside and outside of the European ocean energy sector. This mission is broken down into 6 objectives:1.Maximise European scientific excellence in ocean energy2.Make sustainability and the Just Transition an integral part of ocean energy’s development3.Build a deeper understanding of how ocean energy can optimally fit into the wider energy, industrial & infrastructure systems and planning systems, and help realise this integration4.Empower the SET Plan Ocean Energy Implementation Working Group and other public...
Design of Catalytic Processes with Deep Eutectic Solvents The DECADES doctoral network will conduct innovative research while training 10 PhD candidates with the interdisciplinary skills, intersectoral experience and entrepreneurial mindset to implement sustainability concepts in the European Biotech Sector, making a significant contribution to achieve the GREEN DEAL objectives of European Union. DECADES will focus on solvents as central part of the sustainability of biotechnological processes. Deep Eutectic Solvents (DESs) are biobased and biodegradable solvents that hold potential to revolutionize the chemistry of the 21st century. Aim is to apply these 'Safe and Sustainable-by-Design' solvents to increase efficiency and sustainability...