AI for advanced and collective perception and decision making for CCAM applications (CCAM Partnership)
Programme Category
Programme Name
Programme Description
Horizon Europe is the European Union (EU) funding programme for the period 2021 – 2027, which targets the sectors of research and innovation. The programme’s budget is around € 95.5 billion, of which € 5.4 billion is from NextGenerationEU to stimulate recovery and strengthen the EU’s resilience in the future, and € 4.5 billion is additional aid.
Identifier Code
Call
Summary
To integrate and tackle complex traffic scenarios, CCAM technologies will require highly advanced decision-making based on enhanced collective awareness – the stage beyond on-board perception, advancing, incorporating information from multiple sources and including interpretation for the aggregation of this information. Developing collective awareness should take into account the state of the vehicle, the driver and the road user environment. It can also involve the tracking of other road users’ behaviour and generating predictions on a short horizon, which can be based on the input from advanced behavioural models, e.g. those developed within CL5-2022-D6-01-03 projects. The integration of these findings will lead to collective awareness for CCAM.
The use of multiple sources (sensors and sensor fused information, maps, infrastructure, other road users, and localisation systems) and the sharing of the overall situational information and related intentions of the vehicle and that of its direct environment will be an important building block towards collective awareness. Collective awareness should create a larger time window in safety critical situations and generate benefits for the overarching mobility system, which include efficient traffic management and improved traffic flow as it incorporates situation prediction capabilities and environmental benefits (which can eventually include e.g. smart charging strategies).
In order to continue to define the role and limits of AI and of emerging new developments within AI, this topic recommends exploring Hybrid Intelligence (HI) as such a new subset of AI. Hybrid Intelligence is the process of developing and mobilising Artificial Intelligence (AI) to expand on human intelligence and expertise, thereby ensuring human-like control of CCAM operations. Applying an HI approach will allow CCAM technologies to integrate human expertise and intentionality into its decision-making in order to generate meaningful and appropriate actions that are aligned with ethical, legal and societal values.
Detailed Call Description
Proposed R&I actions are expected to address all of the following aspects:
- Methods to establish collective awareness of CCAM applications that are resilient to faulty sources, thereby ensuring safe operations. Guidance for failsafe designs should be developed.
- Methods to embed an HI approach in the entire action chain towards collective awareness (from basic perception to driving functions) to allow for seamless operation and real-time decision-making while enabling human-like control of CCAM applications by combining system and domain knowledge (of the vehicle and its technologies on one hand and of the transport environment including all the human interactions on the other, thereby understanding of potential risks and capabilities and needs of other road users). Tooling will be required to deliver situational awareness information in a structured way, based on multiple sources and in real-time. In addition, the development and integration of ethical goal functions to support collective awareness should be included. Work is expected to be based on:
- At least perception systems, sensor fusion, high-level world models/maps, vehicle positioning information. Guidance on common reference systems for positioning and time for synchronisation should be included in order to secure robustness and traceability.
- Relationships between the vehicle and forecasted intentions of other road users (e.g. a pedestrian crossing the street at a zebra crossing), as such including spatial temporal relation of elements in the driving-situation.
Proposals should monitor and align relevant developments under this topic with on-going discussions regarding EU type vehicle approval rules as well as in the framework of the UNECE.
This topic implements the co-programmed European Partnership on ‘Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility’ (CCAM). As such, projects resulting from this topic will be expected to report on results to the European Partnership ‘Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility’ (CCAM) in support of the monitoring of its KPIs.
International cooperation is encouraged in particular with Japan and the United States but also with other relevant strategic partners in third countries.
This topic requires the effective contribution of SSH disciplines including ethics and the involvement of SSH experts, institutions as well as the inclusion of relevant SSH expertise, in order to produce meaningful and significant effects enhancing the societal impact of the related research activities.
Call Total Budget
Financing percentage by EU or other bodies / Level of Subsidy or Loan
100%
Expected EU contribution per project: €5.00 million
Thematic Categories
- Environment and Climate Change
- Research, Technological Development and Innovation
- Transport
Eligibility for Participation
- Researchers/Research Centers/Institutions
Eligibility For Participation Notes
If projects use satellite-based earth observation, positioning, navigation and/or related timing data and services, beneficiaries must make use of Copernicus and/or Galileo/EGNOS (other data and services may additionally be used).
The following exceptions apply: subject to restrictions for the protection of European communication networks.
Call Opening Date
Call Closing Date
National Contact Point(s)
Research and Innovation Foundation
29a Andrea Michalakopoulou, 1075 Nicosia,
P.B. 23422, 1683 Nicosia
Telephone: +357 22205000
Fax: +357 22205001
Email: support@research.org.cy
Website: https://www.research.org.cy/en/
Contact Persons:
Mr Christakis Theocharous
Scientific Officer A’
Telephone: +357 22 205 029
Email: ctheocharous@research.org.cy
Mr George Christou
Scientific Officer
Telephone: +357 22 205 030
Email: gchristou@research.org.cy