Jürgen Arund

Life-sustaining artificial kidney treatment or haemodialysis (HD) is needed for end-stage renal disease and critical care patients. High quality HD must ensure effective and personalized blood purification from harmful uremic toxins (UT), among inflammation-cardiovascular disease related middle size (MM)-UT. This, urged by a need for HD surveillance in crisis (coronavirus, war, energy), has created a demand for on-line, bloodless, and non-infectious tools for UT removal monitoring. Optical monitoring can provide a feasible tool for this. However, to date no reliable monitoring technology of MM-UTs is available. This project aims to fill this knowledge gap. Optical spectral signature identification combined with chromatographic and biochemical analyses to reveal the main optical MM markers in biofluids, selection of best signal processing algorithms, and a proof-of-concept in-vivo clinical study is planned to develop a novel optical technology for on-line MM-UT removal monitoring in HD.

Goal of the CoE in ICT, EXCITE, is to bring together the Estonian research competences in the areas of modern robotics, Internet of things, and cyberphysical systems; securiy and dependability; software engineering and foundations of computing; and biomedical application areas. The alignment of research areas strengthens the mutual collaboration and cross the field joint activities, allows to create the capacity and critical mass of next generation ICT researchers. Linking the hardware (robotics, systems design, internet of things, biomedical devices), software and services, developing the security and dependability, working with massive data, and applying these competences to biomedical applications among others, will create a significant impact on society and economy.

"EXCITE brings together the topranked ICT research groups Estonia to work jointly on a focussed, yet broad and extendable, research programme. It will capitalize on the existing expertise to create synergies on the rich but fragmented landscape of the Estonian ICT research. The consortium will advance foundational theories of model verification and data analysis. On this groundwork, it will develop methods and tools for sound practices of designing and analyzing reliable and secure ICT systems processing large data volumes, as demanded by applications to domains of high socioeconomic relevance (cyberphysical and robotic systems, ehealth and biomedical systems). We will start with 10 cooperation themes with clearly defined objectives, methodology and expected results. These themes will be refined and redefined after 3 years. EXCITE will support research sustainability and provide a development opportunity for young researchers by financing 20-30 PhD students and postdocs.