The Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development (FP7) is the biggest ever investment made by the EU in assuring its future as a knowledge-based society. It builds on the successes and experience of previous FPs that have grown in ambition over the years. FP7 has a budget of some €50 billion over the seven years from 2007-2013, constituting an annual average investment that is substantially higher than in previous Framework Programmes and that will, by the end of the period rise, to around 10% of the public spending on research by Member States. A recent FP7 Evaluation Report claims that the principle of excellence in project selection is largely achieved. In much of the Cooperation Programme to which nearly two-thirds of FP7 funding is allocated, leading researchers are being funded. The Top 10 research organizations account so far for 1,2 billion Euro and the Top 50 for 3,1 billion Euro of EU contributions. The 10 Top organisations are:
TALOS is an international research project co-funded from EU 7th Framework Programme funds in Security priority. The main objective of TALOS project is to develop and field test the innovative concept of a mobile, autonomous system for protecting European land borders. The conventional border protection systems are based mainly on expensive ground facilities installed along the entire length of the border complemented by human patrols. The system developed within the TALOS project will be more versatile, efficient, flexible and cost effective.
The complete system applies both aerial and ground unmanned vehicles, supervised by command and control centre. The ground platforms will be both the watching stations and the first reaction patrols, which will inform the Control and Command Centre and an intruder about her/his situation, and will undertake the proper measures to stop the illegal action almost autonomously with supervision of border guard officers.
The most important features of the system are scalability, autonomous operation, mobility, adaptability and modular construction. Through its flexibility it will be easy to adjust the system to the local requirements such as border length and topographic conditions. Important role in the project is given to Border Guards from countries with EU external land border in order to tailor system to end user needs and requirements.
TALOS project consortium has adequate resources to face the challenge. The system will be developed by experts working for 14 institutions from 8 EU member states (Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Poland, Romania, Spain) as well as 1 EU candidate (Turkey) and 1 associated country (Israel). Wide range of the necessary competencies has been ensured by composing the consortium of industrial companies, research institutions, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and a technical university. Project budget sums up to about 20 million Euro, 13 million of which has been granted by the EC.
Social robotics as a tool to serve an aging society and the EU wants to strengthen the global position of European industry in service robotics for “ageing well” as well as significantly advanced state of the art in the field. Robotics is a prioritized research sector in EU's latest FP7 ICT Programme 2011-2012 and robotics scientists are now challenged to demonstrate that robotics assistance can be a cost-effective alternative to institutionalized care while improving quality of life.
Assistive robotics for Ambient Assisted Living
EU demands research proposals that focus on integration of advanced robotics systems and intelligent environments to provide solutions to key issues of relevance for improved independent living and quality of life of elderly people and efficiency of care. Major challenges to be addressed include: self-learning robotics solutions, which can adapt to the user needs and share contextual information with other artefacts in the surroundings of the user; navigate in unstructured environments and perform precise manipulation of relevant objects, provide affective and empathetic user-robotic interaction, taking into account the acceptance by users. Development of basic robotics components is not called for.
Services for elderly people
Services for elderly people should focus on enabling extended independent living and support for higher efficiency and quality of care work based on robotics solutions. Examples of services include support to daily tasks, mediated social interaction with carers and relatives as well as support to mobility. Key stakeholders in the value chain of service provision should be involved, such as care service providers, insurance companies, housing organisations, relevant industry partners and public bodies. Involvement of users will be an essential element as well as appropriate consideration of safety and ethical aspects. Use of open robotics platforms and contribution to standards is encouraged. These services shall be developed and validated against public sector needs through a joint Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP).
Robotics for rehabilitation of stroke and neurological conditions
In the future robots will be part of personal health systems for remote management of diseases, treatment and rehabilitation, outside hospitals and care centres. What is needed are systems providing patient services at home, with telesupervision by health professionals as and when required. Solutions may build on robotic and haptic technologies, wearable systems, implants, human-computer interfaces, web services or virtual reality environments to facilitate continuity of personalised cognitive and functional rehabilitation. Heterogeneous data (e.g., biofeedback, monitoring of limb movements, behavioural monitoring and analysis) and predictive models will be used to assess patient status and progress, monitor risk factors and predict new episodes.
The European Commission's Directorate-General for Research has launched a new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Call: FP7-ICT-2011-7 including Challenge 2: Cognitive Systems and Robotics
Challenge 2 aims to enhance the performance and manageability of artificial cognitive systems and to expand and improve the functionalities of robotic systems operating under circumstances that were not fully planned for explicitly at design time. It supports both research on endowing artificial systems with cognitive capabilities as well as research more specifically related to the design and engineering of robotic systems. The call lists folowing Target Outcomes: a) Robotic systems operating in real-world environments b) Cognition and control in complex systems c) Gearing up and accelerating cross-fertilisation between academic and industrial robotics research d) Fostering communication and co-operation between robotics and cognitive systems research communities e) Speeding up progress towards smarter robots through targeted competitions
Indicative budget distribution: EUR 155 million split in ICT Call 7 Target outcomes a) and d) EUR 73 million, and
ICT Call 9 Target outcomes b), c), e) EUR 82 million. The objective of ICT research under the EU’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) is to improve the competitiveness of European industry – as well as to enable Europe to master and shape the future developments of these technologies so that the demands of its society and economy are met. The EU Member States have earmarked a total of € 9.1 billion for funding ICT over the duration of FP7; making it the largest research theme in the Cooperation programme, which is itself the largest specific programme of FP7 (with 64% of the total budget).
The European Commission has announced Sept 27th, one of the biggest calls ever for information and communications technology (ICT) research proposals under the EU's research framework programmes. The announcement was made at Europe's largest event for ICT research and innovation, ICT 2010-Digitally Driven. It will result in project funding of € 780 million in 2011. This funding will advance research on the future internet, robotics, smart and embedded systems, photonics, ICT for energy efficiency, health and well-being in an ageing society, and more. Under the Digital Agenda for Europe (see IP/10/581, MEMO/10/199 and MEMO/10/200), the Commission has committed to maintaining the pace of a 20% yearly increase of the annual ICT R&D budget at least until 2013. More than 100 groundbreaking (ICT) research projects funded by the EU are being showcased at the "ICT 2010-Digitally Driven" conference and exhibition in Brussels Expo, among them the project “Kompaï the robot” and iCub. The Kompaï robot is designed to assist ill, disabled or ageing people who need help to lead independent lives at home. The robot can speak, understand what is said, find its way around the house, and even access internet services. It reminds users of meetings with friends and family, it can keep track of shopping lists or set up a videoconference on the internet so the users can talk to their doctors. French company Robosoft has designed Kompaï. Other research partners are from Austria, France and Hungary.
iCub can sit, crawl and pick up objects with its five-fingered hands. By watching, listening and touching, the robot learns from its surroundings – just like a child would. There is a growing need for household robots with cognitive skills to tackle the challenge of the ageing society. Assistive robots need to perform household chores like bringing medicine or serving a drink to help the elderly or physically impaired. More than 20 laboratories in the world have adopted iCub. The project was carried out by universities and research centres in Italy, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.
The 4-year ROSETTA project coordinated by ABB Sweden started March 1st, 2009, and has a total budget of 10 MEUR. The goal of the project is to develop “human-centric” technology for industrial robots that will not only appear more human-like, but also cooperate with workers in ways that are safe and perceived as natural. Such robots will be programmed in an intuitive and efficient manner, making it easier to adapt them to new tasks when a production line is changed to manufacture a new product.
ROSETTA is the acronym for a new European Large-Scale Integrating Research Project “RObot control for Skilled ExecuTion of Tasks in natural interaction with humans; based on Autonomy, cumulative knowledge and learning”.
A new solution for elderly care is the synergetic combination of an embodied mobile robotic companion in an ambient assited living environment that supports carers, both family members and therapists, in their daily tasks. The CompanionAble Project started January 1, 2008 and coordinated by The University of Reading, UK. The project is aimed to provide the synergy of Robotics and Ambient Intelligence technologies and their semantic integration for a care-giver's assistive environment. This will support the cognitive stimulation and therapy management of the care-recipient. This is mediated by a robotic companion (mobile facilitation) working collaboratively with a smart home environment (stationary facilitation).
German MetraLabs GmbH is responsible for the design and implementation of the Robot Companion Scenario. MetraLabs is the leader of WP6 and also contributes to the robot specification (requirements engineering, standards, robot technologies), the architecture and the verification of the robot.
An European consortium coordinated by German ALBERT-LUDWIGS-UNIVERSITAET FREIBURG aims to develop the foundations for service robots designed to autonomously navigate in urban environments outdoors as well as in shopping malls and shops to provide various services to users including guidance, delivery, and transportation. The project called European robotic pedestrian assistant (EUROPA) will apply sophisticated probabilistic scene interpretation techniques to deal with the unpredictable and changing environments. Based on data gathered with its sensors, the robot will acquire a detailed model of the environment, detect and track moving objects in the environment, adapt its navigation behaviour according to the current situation and communicate with its users in a natural way, even remotely. EUROPA is targeted at developing novel technologies that will open new perspectives for commercial applications of service robots in the future.
The project will start 2 March 2009 and end 1 March 2012. The project cost is 3, 84 million Euro and is funded by the European Commission (FP7-ICT-231888) with 2.94 million Euro.
Partners: Albert-Ludwigs-Universitaet Freiburg, Germany; University of Oxford, United Kingdom; Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule Zurich, Switzerland; Bluebotics SA, Switzerland; Rheinisch-Westfaelische Technische Hochschule Aachen, Germany; Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium.
