Objectives, activities, model contracts
IST objectives
Information Society Technologies (IST) is an integrated research programme
of the European Commission aiming at convergency of information processing
technologies, communication technologies and multimedia technologies.
Planned budget for IST priority within the Sixth Framework Programme for
research and Development is 3.625 billion EUR. IST programme is managed by
Information Society Directorate General.
Activities
Overview of activities within the Information Society Technologies
priority can be found at: http://www.cordis.lu/ist/activities/activities.htm
"IST Vision:
anywhere anytime natural access to
IST services for all"
These are the research
activities that are eligible for funding under the IST priority.
The points correspond to the IST
2003-2004 Work Programme.
Strategic objectives
Applied IST
research addressing major societal and economic
challenges
2.3.1.5
Towards a global dependability
and security framework
To strengthen security and enhance
dependability of the information and communication systems and
infrastructures and to ensure trust and confidence in the use of IST by
addressing new security and dependability challenges. These are resulting
from higher complexity, ubiquity of computing and communications,
mobility, and increased dynamicity of content. Integrated and
comprehensive approaches involving all relevant stakeholders of the value
chain should address security and dependability at different levels and
from different perspectives.
2.3.1.9
Networked businesses and
governments
To develop ICTs supporting organisational
networking, process integration, and sharing of resources. This shall
enable networked organisations, private and public, to build faster and
more effective partnerships and alliances, to re-engineer and integrate
their processes, to develop value added products and services, and to
share efficiently knowledge and experiences.
This objective addresses eBusiness,
eGovernment
and eWork.
2.3.1.10 eSafety for road and
air transport
To develop, test and assess an integrated and
global approach to intelligent road vehicles and aircraft which offers
higher safety and value added services, where interactions between the
person in control, the vehicle and the information infrastructure are
addressed in an integrated way.
2.3.1.11 eHealth
To
develop an intelligent environment that enables ubiquitous management of
citizens’ health status, and to assist health professionals in coping
with some major challenges, risk management and the integration into
clinical practice of advances in health knowledge.
This strategic objective is managed by the eHealth
unit (shortcuts: eHealth
projects, eHealth
publications, eHealth
events, eHealth
who's who).
2.3.1.12
Technology-enhanced learning and access to cultural heritage
To
develop advanced systems and services that help improve access to Europe's
knowledge and educational resources (including cultural and scientific
collections) and generate new forms of cultural and learning experiences.
More information about the Commission's activities related to this
strategic objective can be found on the web sites Technology
Enhanced Learning (TeLearn) and Preservation
and Enhancement of Cultural Heritage (DigiCult).
2.3.2.6 Applications and services for
the mobile user and worker
To foster the emergence of rich
landscape of innovative applications and services for the mobile user and
worker and to support the use and development of new work methods and
collaborative work environments. These should be based on interoperable
mobile, wireless technologies and the convergence of fixed and mobile
communication infrastructures. Such applications and services will enable
new business models, new ways of working, improved customer relations and
government services in any context.
The target applications and services will be capable of being seamlessly
accessed and provided anywhere, anytime and in any context.
2.3.2.7 Cross-media content for leisure and
entertainment
To improve the full digital content chain,
covering creation, acquisition, management and production, through
effective multimedia technologies enabling multi-channel, cross-platform
access to media, entertainment and leisure content in the form of film,
music, games, news and alike. It will accelerate take up in B2B, B2C and
C2C, currently hampered by insufficient productivity, convergence and high
cost.
2.3.2.8
GRID-based systems for solving complex problems
- To expand
the potential of the Grid and peer-to-peer approaches to Complex Problems
Solving which can not be solved with current technologies in application
fields such as, but not limited to, industrial design, engineering and
manufacturing, health, genomics and drug design, environment, critical
infrastructures, energy, business and finance, and new media.
- To overcome present architectural and design limitations hampering the
use and wider deployment of computing and knowledge Grids and to enrich
its capabilities by including new functionalities required for Complex
Problem Solving. This should help the larger uptake of Grid type
architectures and extend the concept from computation Grids to knowledge
Grids, eventually leading to a "semantic Grid".
2.3.2.9
Improving risk management
To
develop open platforms, integrated systems and components for improved
risk management, civil security applications (including threats from
anti-personnel landmines), and environmental management. To foster the
emergence of a European info-structure and service platforms which will
facilitate the use of interoperable components and sub-systems. The work
should contribute to the implementation of the GMES action plan, notably
to the development of the part related to risk management.
2.3.2.10
eInclusion
-
To promote eInclusion as a core horizontal building block in the
establishment of the Information Society to ensure equal access and
participation for all in Europe.
- To develop intelligent systems that empower persons with disabilities
and ageing citizens to play a full role in society and to increase their
autonomy.
Research activities will
also be conducted in two others priorities: 'Citizens and Governance in
a Knowledge Society' and 'Support to EU policies'.
2.3.3.1
Products and services engineering 2010
To strengthen
further Europe's competitive position by developing collaborative
technologies and methodologies for extended service and product
development approaches, including associated services and distributed
global manufacturing organisation. Community funding should help
integrate, in a global context, fragmented European and international
(e.g. IMS) RTD efforts in product and process design, and to focus on new
holistic product/service concepts.
Communication, computing and software
technologies
2.3.1.3 Broadband for
all
To develop the network technologies and architectures
allowing a generalised availability of broadband access to European users
including those in less developed regions. This is a key enabler to the
wider deployment of the information and knowledge-based society and
economy.
2.3.1.4 Mobile and wireless systems beyond
3G
To realise the vision of "Optimally connected
anywhere, anytime". Early preparatory work has characterized Systems
beyond 3G as an horizontal communication model, where different
terrestrial access levels and technologies are combined to complement each
other in an optimum way for different service requirements and radio
environments. They may include the personal level (personal/body area/ad
hoc network) the local/home level (W-LAN, UWB) the cellular level (GPRS,
UMTS) the wider area level (DxB-T, BWA).
The resulting access landscape
is complemented by a satellite overlay network, providing notably a global
multicast layer (e.g. S-DMB). Reconfigurability is a key enabler to
support such an heterogeneous and generalised wireless access.
2.3.1.8
Networked audiovisual systems and home
platforms
To develop end-to-end networked audio-visual
systems and applications, and open trusted and interoperable multimedia
user platforms and devices, notably for broadcasting and in-home platforms
with full interactivity capacity.
2.3.2.3 Open development
platforms for software and services
To build open
development and run-time environments for software and services providing
the next generation of methodologies, interoperable middleware and tools
to support developers - through all phases of the software life-cycle,
from requirements analysis until deployment and maintenance - in the
production of networked and distributed software systems and services,
embedded software and value-added user services. This will enable the
development of future software engineering methods and tools.
2.3.2.5
Embedded
systems
To develop the next generation of technologies and
tools for modelling, design, implementation and operation of
hardware/software systems embedded in intelligent devices. An end-to-end
systems vision should allow to build cost-efficient systems with optimal
performance, high confidence, reduced time to market and faster
deployment.
Components and
microsystems
2.3.1.1 Pushing the limits of CMOS
and preparing for post-CMOS
To develop, ahead of the ITRS
international roadmap, semiconductor devices shrunk by an order of
magnitude down to the 5 nm size, and alternative devices for the post-CMOS
era. Research will also aim at enabling the design in-time and at cost, of
reliable 1 billion gate systems-on-chip or systems-in-package, improving
productivity by a factor of 10 by 2010. This will help prepare for the
electronic components of 2010 and beyond.
2.3.1.2 Micro- and nano-systems
To
improve the cost-efficiency, performance and functionality of micro and
nano-systems and to increase the level of integration and miniaturisation
allowing for improved interfacing with their surroundings and with
networked services and systems. This should foster their integration into
a wide range of intelligent products and applications.
2.3.2.1
Advanced displays
To
develop, demonstrate and prepare for industrialisation emerging display
technologies related to organic materials, lightweight near-to-the-eye
information terminals and large size displays for the consumer like wall
paper TV displays in order to improve their performance, cost efficiency,
their integration in any system and their interfacing with the user.
2.3.2.2
Optical, opto-electronic, and
photonic functional components
To develop advanced
materials, micro- and nano-scale photonic structures and devices,
solid-state sources and to realise optoelectronic integrated circuits
(OEIC). In the last 20 years, optics and photonics have become
increasingly pervasive in a wide range of industrial applications. It has
now become the heart of a new industry, building on microelectronics with
which it will be increasingly linked.
Projects are expected to address
research challenges for 2010 and beyond in one or more of the following
application contexts: "telecommunication and infotainment"
(components for "low-cost high-bandwidth" and "Terabyte
storage"), "health care and life science" (minimally
invasive photonic diagnostics and therapies, biophotonic devices),and
"Environment and Security" (photonic sensors and imagers).
Knowledge and interface
technologies
2.3.1.6 Multimodal
interfaces
To develop natural and adaptive multimodal
interfaces that respond intelligently to speech and language, vision,
gesture, haptics and other senses.
2.3.1.7 Semantic-based
knowledge systems
To develop semantic-based and
context-aware systems to acquire, organise, process, share and use the
knowledge embedded in multimedia content. Research will aim to maximise
automation of the complete knowledge lifecycle and achieve semantic
interoperability between Web resources and services.
2.4.8
Cognitive systems
To develop artificial systems that can
interpret data arising from real-world events and processes (mainly in the
form of data-streams from sensors of all types and in particular from
visual and/or audio sources); acquire situated knowledge of their
environment; act, make or suggest decisions and communicate with people on
human terms, thereby supporting them in performing complex tasks.
(Draft Workprogramme 2005-2006)
The following activities, although not incorporated as Strategic
Objectives (due to their wider scope in the case of FET and General
Accompanying Actions), are complementary to the IST objectives of FP6.
Future and Emerging
Technologies (FET)
Open
scheme - The purpose of FET open is to enable a range of
ideas for future and emerging technologies to be explored and realised.
The scheme is open to the widest possible spectrum of research
opportunities that relate to Information Society Technologies.
Proactive
initiatives - FET proactive initiatives aim at focusing
resources on visionary and challenging long-term goals that are timely and
have strong potential for future impact. These goals provide a common
strategic perspective and a focal point around which a critical mass of
research can be assembled and synergies developed.
Research networking
test-beds
General accompanying
actions
Model contracts
can be found at: http://www.cordis.lu/fp6/find-doc.htm#modelcontracts
.