Press release -
Improving the sustainability and security of critical infrastructure through Artificial Intelligence
Politecnico di Milano among the partners of the AI4REALNET European project that supports operators of electrical, railway and air traffic systems in the implementation of artificial intelligence-human interactions
Milan, 13 December 2023 - Using Artificial Intelligence to support human decisions, increasing efficiency and security in the operation of critical infrastructure. This is the aim of the European Horizon Europe project AI4REALNET - AI for REAL-World network operation.
Led by the Portuguese research institute INESC TEC and involving the Department of Electronics, Information and Bioengineering and the Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering of Politecnico di Milano and other partners from France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden and Austria, the project promotes collaboration between humans and artificial intelligence. The goal is to support the decisions of human operators and to create the conditions for the decarbonisation of crucial sectors such as energy and transport.
It is not about replacing humans with AI, but rather ensuring that AI emerges as a support for faster decisions and even planning specific tasks autonomously.
The project aims to reduce the operators’ workload in areas where human intervention prevails, offering opportunities to address critical infrastructure challenges. AI4REALNET developments will be validated in six industrial use cases, demonstrating tangible added value.
‘The ultimate goal ,' explains Prof. Marcello Restelli, project coordinator for Politecnico di Milano, 'is to improve the security and resilience of critical infrastructure, which is becoming increasingly complex due to the increase in information and the challenges imposed by decarbonisation. The AI4REALNET consortium believes that AI can increase operational effectiveness and reduce errors'.
Industry involvement will promote awareness of the benefits of reinforcement learning and explainable machine learning. The project will also use open-source AI-friendly digital environments such as Grid2Op, Flatland and BlueSky to foster and advance a global artificial intelligence community.
The project, which is funded with around 4 million euros by the European Union through the Horizon Europe programme and 2 million euros by the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI), emphasises international collaboration to tackle crucial societal challenges.
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Politecnico di Milano is a scientific-technological university which trains engineers, architects and industrial designers.
The University has always focused on the quality and innovation of its teaching and research, developing a fruitful relationship with business and productive world by means of experimental research and technological transfer.
Research has always been linked to didactics and it is a priority commitment which has allowed Politecnico Milano to achieve high quality results at an international level as to join the university to the business world. Research constitutes a parallel path to that formed by cooperation and alliances with the industrial system.
Knowing the world in which you are going to work is a vital requirement for training students. By referring back to the needs of the industrial world and public administration, research is facilitated in following new paths and dealing with the need for constant and rapid innovation. The alliance with the industrial world, in many cases favored by Fondazione Politecnico and by consortiums to which Politecnico belong, allows the university to follow the vocation of the territories in which it operates and to be a stimulus for their development.
The challenge which is being met today projects this tradition which is strongly rooted in the territory beyond the borders of the country, in a relationship which is developing first of all at the European level with the objective of contributing to the creation of a single professional training market. Politecnico takes part in several research, sites and training projects collaborating with the most qualified European universities. Politecnico's contribution is increasingly being extended to other countries: from North America to Southeast Asia to Eastern Europe. Today the drive to internationalization sees Politecnico Milano taking part into the European and world network of leading technical universities and it offers several courses beside many which are entirely taught in English.
