TITAN: Frugal Artificial Intelligence and Application in Astrophysics
Dates: 01/2023 – 02/2027
Funded by: European Commission, Horizon Europe, HORIZON-WIDERA-2022-TALENTS-01, ERA Chairs
Project Coordinator: P. Tsakalides
ERA Chair: Jean-Luc Starck (CEA, Saclay, France)
Funding: € 2,500,000
Summary: TITAN aims to create an interdisciplinary, international and multicultural center of excellence that will establish the Foundation for Research & Technology – Hellas (FORTH) as a world-leading research centre in the emerging field of Astroinformatics. Our tools, methods, and applications of computational science, machine learning, and statistics will advance research and education in data-oriented Astronomy.
The primary pillar of TITAN, namely, appointing an outstanding researcher and research manager as the ERA Chair holder of Astroinformatics to incept and lead a research program in computational astrophysics and data science, will couple, transform and expand two major research operations at FORTH - Computer Science and Astrophysics - while rooting an effective bridge between regional research excellence and international missions.
The second pillar of TITAN will fully unlock the potential of the Institutes of Computer Science and Astrophysics, the Crete region and Greece through the implementation of additional measures, geared towards: Capacity building (expansion of the research ecosystem, advanced training opportunities); Institutional development and structural change (further exploration of the installed research and technology capacity, HR and Equity, Inclusion and Diversity strategies); Intersectoral and international partnership activities in the field of Computational Astrophysics, reinforcing a Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) culture.
Beyond increasing the attractiveness of the Crete region for internationally excellent research talents in line with the ERA priorities, TITAN will synergize its efforts with existing regional, national and international initiatives to (i) integrate FORTH into the Smart Specialization Strategy of Greece, (ii) enhance the regional/international role of FORTH as a hub for advanced space-related technologies, and (iii) raise awareness of the importance of data science, machine learning and statistical methods across science and engineering domains (from astrophysics to biomedical imaging) and their impact to society.
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