Abstract
Innovation Convention 2011
The Innovation Convention, held in Bruxelles on December 5–6, 2011, was an essential part of the Innovation Union flagship initiative.
Research and innovation are the main motors for sustainable job creation and the only way to achieve a sustainable exit from the current economic crisis. This conference brought together world leading experts in research and innovation to share their views on building a global innovation economy.
The Innovation Convention 2011 was led by the President of the European Commission, Mr. José Manuel Barroso, and Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, European Commissioner for Research, Innovation, and Science. It was Europe's premier innovation event, with more than 1,200 selected participants.
Speakers included Don Tapscott, Chairman of Moxie Insight (Canada) and co-author of “Macrowikinomics: Rebooting Business and the World”; Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman of Google (USA); Claudie Haigneré, former astronaut and President of Universcience (FR); Professor Henry Chesbrough, Centre for Open Innovation (USA); Sam Pitroda, entrepreneur and advisor to the Prime Minister of India on innovation; Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist, former Professor of the Public Understanding of Science, and author of several books, including “The God Delusion” (UK); Silvia Venturini Fendi, fashion designer (IT); and Michael O'Leary, CEO, Ryanair (IE).
The conference will take place on a regular basis to take stock of the progress made toward the objectives of the Innovation Union and to discuss ways forward with a broader perspective in the global innovative economy.
This year's event also featured an area dedicated to career opportunities and advice for researchers on key innovation issues such as patents, IPR, and venture capital, as well as an exhibition of innovative EU-funded research. The selected project, which represents the most innovative European projects (Star Projects), will be described in this and in the forthcoming issues.
Star EU-Funded Research and Innovation Projects (Part 1)
1. ADDRESS: Interactive energy
The ADDRESS project aims at developing solutions to enable active demand (AD) for electricity and to exploit its benefits. The project introduces an energy box, which enables end users to determine their use of electricity at the best moment for the grid. This way, electricity consumers can be made active participants in the electricity industry. Their electrical consumption can be made flexible, with optimized operation of loads, embedded generation and storage, all resulting in economic incentives.
At our stand, visitors will understand what AD is, how it could take place in their homes, how it impacts their lives, and what else is behind it.
Stella Di Carlo,
2. ALMA Enhancement: State-of-the-art receiver for ALMA, the world's largest radio telescope
The Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) is the most powerful radio telescope for observing the universe. With its band 5 receiver, developed and produced in Europe thanks to FP6, ALMA will study a wide range of phenomena from observing objects from the earliest days of the universe to solar system planetary studies, gaining deeper knowledge of the Earth's climate changes. ALMA has and will continue to create new jobs in European industry. It will operate at an observatory located on the Chajnantor plateau at 5,000 meters altitude in Chile.
At our stand, we will present the ALMA observatory and exhibit a band 5 receiver.
Hans Rykaczewski,
3. BrainAble: Autonomy and social inclusion through communication without movement
BrainAble seeks to improve the autonomy and quality of life of the physically disabled, based on Brain/Neuronal Computer Interface (BNCI). By combining affective computing, ambient intelligence, and virtual environments, a brain–computer interface enables people to communicate without moving.
Visitors to our stand will be able to test the current prototype and experience features such as navigation through the virtual representation of a home, interaction and control of smart home devices, as well as the use of social networks and communication tools.
Felip Miralles,
4. CASBLIP: Sound maps to help visually impaired people find their way
The CASBLIP project focused on cognitive systems research. It aimed to develop devices capable of interpreting and managing real world information and transforming it into sounds to support the mobility of blind and visually impaired people. Thanks to this concept, blind people are able to perceive surrounding obstacles by sounds and can avoid them.
The stand will present the prototype developed in the project, which uses infrared laser technology. Visitors will also be able to test the EYE21 glasses, which were developed in a spin-off of the CASBLIP project, EYE2021.
Guillermo Peris-Fajarnes,
5. CLEAR-UP; Clean and resource efficient buildings for real life
CLEAR-UP presents a holistic approach to creating good indoor environment in buildings whilst reducing their operational energy use. CLEAR-UP works within the public–private partnership Energy-efficient Buildings (EeB). It brings nanomaterials from the lab into real applications, and develops sensors and control strategies to optimize the user needs for fresh air, good light, and comfortable temperatures.
Investigate at our stand how sensors, controls, and components work together, and experience the prospects of indoor air cleaning by use of novel photocatalytic materials!
Dr. Isolde Simon,
6. COMPANIONABLE; Companion robots for the elderly
CompanionAble aims to provide support for the elderly living alone at home. At the heart of the project is Hector, a mobile robot, who is designed to become a companion for elderly people in their intelligent home environment. Hector can engage in social interaction (via videoconferencing), cognitive training, health and safety monitoring, entertainment, and reminders, thus helping to increase the quality of life of the elderly.
Come to our stand to meet Hector yourself, who will demonstrate his wide range of capabilities such as calling a friend, tracking items, or showing emotional intelligence.
Prof. Atta Badii,
7. DE-LIGHT: Lightweight crashworthy train cab
The DE-LIGHT cab is a technology demonstrator for a lightweight, crashworthy rail vehicle driver's cab. It employs advanced sandwich material technology for the main cab structure and crash energy absorption devices. By focusing on affordable materials and by combining them in a novel, highly integrated fashion, the cab is able to exploit simultaneously the lightweight and energy absorption benefits of these materials whilst providing savings in assembly, outfitting, and operational costs.
At the exhibition, visitors will be presented with the 1/8 scale model of the DE- Light cab.
Karen McTigue,
8. DEPHOTEX: Textiles become photovoltaic
DEPHOTEX develops photovoltaic textiles with properties inherent to fabrics: flexibility, low weight, durability, water/dust resistance, only feasible if the fabric itself turns out to be photovoltaic.
The exhibition will show examples of applications from wearable or mobile consumer goods like jackets, pillows, or car dashboards for charging iPhones or GPS to larger area surfaces like curtains or coverings able to generate electricity for lighting or warming. Visitors will observe the different layers of a textile cell and see a real working textile cell connected, as well as check its flexibility.
Fanny Breuil,
9. EPOSBED: Easy positioning of in-bed patients with reduced mobility
The EPOSbed™ product consists of a specialty bed with automatic positioning, driven by intelligent software. It allows patients with limited mobility to change their position in bed without the need of assistance. The patient is able to command the movements of the bed with slight body movements. No need to use a remote controller or human assistance. The EPOSbed™ system was validated in preclinical trials with different types of people.
Come to our stand to test the bed yourself!
10. E-SWARM: Swarms of cooperating robots
Swarmanoid is a heterogeneous swarm robotics system composed of three different robot types: foot-bots, hand-bots, and eye-bots. The project was initially developed thanks to a FET Open project and is currently being developed further thanks to the ERC Advanced Grant E-SWARM.
At our stand, we will show the three prototypes and present some live demos of the foot-bots exhibiting collective behaviors that exploit self-organizing principles. Additionally, there will be videos that show our heterogeneous swarm acting in complex scenarios.
Prof. Marco Dorigo,