The aim of this call is to facilitate and financially support crossdisciplinary collaborations between our four institutions that are geared towards initiatives where Artificial Intelligence plays a crucial role in advancing the state-of-the art in Preventive Health and Circularity. With this call we aim to connect the main research areas of the alliance.

The seed funding stimulates the development of research projects that will contribute to the innovative development and application of trustworthy AI. Proposals should focus on the innovative use of AI-methods and tap into at least one of the themes/research lines of Preventive Health or Circular Society which are mentioned below.

Trustworthy AI research themes

Data Science and AI are key enablers for scientific discovery and revolutionize the way we do science. However, an intrinsic challenge of working with AI methods is misuse, concerns with validity, accuracy, transportability, and other unwanted effects such as difficulties with explainability and transparency. In this call, we welcome projects that:

1. Change the state of the art in issues of Preventive Health or Circularity through the application or development of trustworthy AI;
2. Innovate in the development and application of trustworthy AI methods applied in Preventive Health and Circularity.

Preventive Health research themes 

Within Preventive Health we want to understand how lifestyle and environmental factors influence the independent functioning of individuals, and what the role of their biological and social systems is. How can these factors influence resilience, and how can we improve self-efficacy of individuals and societies through lifestyle, environmental, societal, medical and technological support and innovations? Preventive Health wants to work on system changes where solutions from the different domains  (environmental and curative health, nutrition and innovative technology) are combined to support the sustained  transformative change towards independent functioning and sustained self-efficacy in different phases of life.

Research lines Preventive Health : 

1. Healthy start. Research targeting youth (<20) facing economic, educational disadvantages and societal challenges,  increasing our understanding of the factors that shape youth development, that explain why some successfully  navigate transitions, and adapt to setbacks and adversity, and others do not and factors increasing the odds of  favorable developmental outcomes.
2. Preserving Health. Research targeting persons facing economic, educational disadvantages and societal challenges, aimed at  increasing our knowledge in support of preventive interventions aimed at reducing health inequalities and the  burden of disease.
3. Health@Home. Research in support of providing preventive health services in the own living environment of people, instead of  in healthcare settings and supporting healthy living.
4. Living with disease. Research aimed at increasing our knowledge and developing precise interventions that support the quality of  life, participation in society of patients of all ages living with (chronic) disease and/or disabilities.

Circular Society research themes

The gathering, processing and interpretation of (digital) data is an important element in assessing, designing and evaluating the circularity of real-world systems, and in determining impacts on the environment and human  beings. Digital twinning, AI and serious gaming can be important technologies or tools in such circular design. We are interested in proposals that contribute to one or both of our focus areas: Circular Safe Hospitals and Urban-Rural Balancing.  

Research lines Circular Safe Hospitals:

1. Circular strategies for medical devices and procedures. Hospitals need to move away from their “take-make-waste” culture with regards to medical procedures,  devices and single-use products and become torchbearers for sustainable supply chains instead.
2. Medication without harm – preventing waste and pollution. One potential improvement is the reuse of prescribed and distributed, yet unused medication, which would  reduce waste of resources used for production, packaging and transport. Another issue addressed is that  after usage, medication residues can pollute surface and ground water, having a major negative impact on  the environment and eventually on human health.
3. Future proof patient diets – balancing nutrition and circularity. In this research line we investigate nutritious food with a minimal ecological footprint from farm to fork and  develop strategies and scalable solutions for hospitals to offer a healthy diet within the planetary  boundaries.

Research lines Urban-Rural Balancing:

1. Resolving the economic, legal and socio-cultural barriers among and between urban and rural citizens  and organisations enabling circularity as well as equity.
2. Nature based solutions as driver for circular urban systems in balance with rural environments.

Specific challenges we identify are the nutrient challenge, the green landscape & water challenge, the  sustainable energy & materials challenge, and the Global South challenge (what can we learn from for  example low-tech solutions used elsewhere & the other way around).

Budget

The maximum amount that can be requested per application is €40K. The total foreseen budget is 240K.

Deadline

Deadline for application is 15 February 2023, 6 PM.

Forms

• Terms and Conditions
• Application Form
• Budget template

Contact

For questions about this call, please contact:
• TU/e: Dasha Alexeeva D.V.Alexeeva@tue.nl
• WUR: Ben Schaap Ben.Schaap@wur.nl
• UU: Laurence Frank L.E.Frank@uu.nl 
• UMC Utrecht: Annelotte Vonk A.M.Vonk-3@umcutrecht.nl

Or contact us in our Teams environment: this is something we are testing at the moment. It is intended to provide space for the researches to link to each other, find relevant expertise within our 4 institutions and ask questions regarding the call. Join our team with this link.