Projects

The CROSS project aims to strengthen the European Research Area by developing innovative tools to mainstream the new Charters´ principles, fostering organisational change and career interoperability. Key outputs include a Self-Assessment Competence Tool, a comprehensive Roadmap for transversal skills training, a Mentoring Handbook, a Roadmap for career counseling, an Intersectoral Collaboration Handbook, and an HRS4R Repository. These form a comprehensive set of career management services, which will be piloted and implemented across four intersectoral networks. The development of these resources will follow a co-creative process, engaging stakeholders across Europe, facilitated through the creation of our ResearchComp Community of Practice. This approach ensures their adaptability to diverse European ecosystems. A key component of CROSS is the creation of a platform designed to support institutions in obtaining the HRS4R award. This platform can also serve as a shared resource for all projects funded under this call, ensuring their continued use and expansion beyond the project’s lifecycle. By promoting organisational change, CROSS will benefit research-performing organisations and researchers at all career stages, significantly improving career prospects and delivering broader societal impact.

The Xpanding Innovative Alliance (XiA) project is dedicated to advancing interoperability within the healthcare sector, particularly in anticipation of the European Health Data Space (EHDS) regulation. Through a comprehensive educational initiative, XiA aims to address the skills gap in advanced digital health interoperability standards among healthcare providers, digital health solution providers, and individuals. By developing high-quality educational materials and courses, XiA seeks to equip stakeholders with the necessary skills to embrace EHDS-related standards and foster a culture of interoperability.

For the development of the field of human-robot cooperation, a development and test laboratory for collaborative robotics and process-adaptive devices will be created based on the Virumaa Innovation Centre of Digitalisation and Green Technologies, Virumaa College, and Taltech's headquarters. In the created laboratory, it will be possible to study the psychological aspects of human-machine co-creation, workplace design, etc. In addition, adaptability of equipment/physical systems to production processes. All this in both real and digital (augmented reality) environments, based on the Industry X.0 concept.

In traditional food systems, additives derived from petrochemicals and animal products are widely used. While these compounds may possess desired techno-functional properties, they come with environmental, ethical, health, and sustainability issues. The goal of this project is to develop alternative protein-based food additives, such as colorants and sweeteners, that meet the needs of the food industry while addressing the concerns. Rational design, structural biology, and AI methods are utilized for protein development. In collaboration with TFTAK, a precision fermentation platform is developed to produce proteins in microorganisms. Protein samples are tested in model foods. Successful prototypes are commercialized through partnerships with the local food industry and startup accelerators. The gathered experimental data is used to model relationships between protein structure and techno-functional properties, facilitating the design of novel food proteins in the future.

Wood or lignocellulosic biomass more generally, is a readily available renewable resource, offering sustainable solutions for our growing human population. The core wood polymers - cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin - serve as fundamental components, extending beyond paper production to produce valuable wood sugars, textile fibers, thermoplastics, and fine chemicals. In our project, we are developing enzyme technologies utilizing extremophilic microbe-derived enzymes to break down and modify lignin, remove toxic phenolic compounds, convert cellulose into wood sugars, and advance enzyme-catalyzed cellulose technologies. Additionally, the project focuses on advancing technologies for converting kraft, hydrolysis (and organosolv) and synthetic lignins into porous materials, thermoplastics, and cutting-edge catalysts.

The project is aimed at changing the current paradigm of using oil shale by direct transformation of its valuable structural components into high-value chemicals, with the goal of developing an environmentally friendly chemical industry. The focus is set on expanding advanced methods for obtaining base chemicals through the chemical transformation of kerogens from various sources, as well as developing environmentally friendly holistic solutions. These efforts aim to enhance the efficiency of using other geological resources and allow for the utilization of already generated waste. The objective is to develop innovative uses for raw materials that create added value, find applications for residual oil shale in waste rock piles, and align with green transition strategies. The focus is on Estonian mineral resources, but the project also envisions the utilization of other difficult-to-transform organic materials for obtaining chemicals.

In engineered wood production, the wood goes through many process steps, which affect both the wood and the final product quality. Holistic studies on the co-effect of these processes on adhesive bond quality are lacking. Despite a 20 year old theoretical basis to understand poor adhesion and adhesive testing variability, the tools to understand the impact on surface defects on bond quality are underdeveloped, resulting in uncontrolled bonding conditions, high variances, and slow technical progress. In addition, the fire resistance of engineered wood structures is investigated. Design and assessment methods are improved, and their scope widened to new innovative wood products based on experimental studies and thermo-mechanical simulations. This will accelerate the implementation of bio-based adhesives, improving the competitiveness and safety of the engineered wood products and promoting the utilization of low-quality wood species.

Data has become the most valuable resource for the automation and optimization of tasks arising both in the private and public spheres. The proposed research area/project aims at strengthening both the synergy and quality of the current research of Taltech in this area, while significantly enhancing the capabilities of Uni to cooperate with Estonian industry and public sphere by joint work, consultations, continuous and regular education. The focus of the project is on using machine learning for data science: ML, in particular deep learning, has shown the most promise in advancing the capabilities of future software systems and empowering the whole business of software development. The concrete goal is to increase the manpower and competence in machine learning, while enhancing and cooperating with the existing areas of data science like data and rule mining, data semantics and knowledge representation, natural language data queries, data integration, statistics and data management.

The present project aims to develop novel and enhance existing methods of explainable artificial intelligence for the analysis of human motor functions. Pilot studies have demonstrated promising results to support the diagnosis of neurodegenerative diseases. In addition, we plan to extend the area of application from medicine to cognitive development and cognitive fatigue analysis. The integration of the explainer component will provide medical professionals with the necessary transparency of the decisions made by AI. Application in the area of cognitive development to support the school education process. Cognitive fatigue is known to cause severe injuries and serious financial losses. In-depth understanding of this phenomenon and ability to recognise mental fatigue targets to make the work environment safer and reduce monetary and non-monetary losses in the process of work.

Reinforcing Skills in Chips Design for Europe (RESCHIP4EU) aims to support the excellence of EU higher education in the area of embedded systems design in a holistic way, from silicon via System-on-Chip design and manufacturing to smart and safety-critical platform and application software. The holistic nature of the program is essential for innovation and provides a unique competitive edge to program graduates to design, analyse and innovate smart, green and safety-critical embedded systems in Europe. RESCHIP4EU will achieve this goal by designing and delivering a double-degree master’s programme (ISCED Level 7, 120 ECTS) in Embedded Systems Design with several specialisations related to the holistic design of embedded platforms safer, greener, smarter, and more efficient and a minor in Innovation and Entrepreneurship. The master’s programme will be designed and delivered by 9 higher education institutions from 5 different countries with the collaboration of Semi.org, the global industry association representing the electronics manufacturing and design supply chain, ST Microelectronics, a global semiconductor company, 1 innovative SME expert in delivering education program, communication and dissemination, 1 ASBL (Association internationale sans but lucrative), and EIT Digital, a pan-European organisation with experience in delivering education programmes in advanced digital skills across Europe.

TIRAMISU “Training and Innovation in Reliable and Efficient Chip Design for Edge AI” is a European HORIZON MSCA Doctoral Network project. The general research objective of TIRAMISU is a practical methodology for reliable and energy-efficient Edge AI hardware backbone design and innovation management. The action will provide strong interdisciplinary training for future European engineers and researchers driving the innovation for reliable and energy-efficient Edge AI chips. The consortium is strategically designed to foster cross-disciplinary synergies, by seamlessly integrating innovation management research with the technical aspects of Edge AI design. The non-academic sector is represented by a European flagship R&D hub for nanoelectronics - IMEC, a global leader in industrial electronics and the largest semiconductor manufacturer in Germany - Infineon, a trusted automotive solutions provider - Dumarey, the worldwide leader in EDA tools development - Cadence. The academic excellence is established by the top ICT and Technology Innovation engineering universities and Europe's largest application-oriented research organisation - Fraunhofer.

Organic electrochemistry is transforming modern synthesis by offering green, efficient methods that replace toxic oxidants and reductants with electricity. Continuous flow electrosynthesis, superior to batch processes, addresses challenges like heat transfer, mixing, and scalability enabling lab-scale replication of industrial methods. This project targets the sustainable synthesis of alkyl and fluoroalkyl hypervalent iodine reagents (λ3-iodanes) using electrochemical flow methods. Traditionally generated with stoichiometric oxidants, these reagents cause waste and separation issues. Electrochemical strategies allow access to unstable aliphatic iodanes cleanly. Their use in stereoselective α-alkylation, amination, and nucleophilic (radio)fluorination and fluoroalkylation reactions will be explored. This work aligns with the European Green Deal, advancing green chemistry and innovation in sustainable catalysis.

NdFeB are the strongest and highest energy density permanent magnets used in both green energy production in wind generators and electric cars. NdFeB production technology is comparable to that of lithium battery: both are of key importance, require limited mineral resources to be mined, recycling is difficult. The recycling of NdFeB would reduce the EU's dependence on China being more economical and cheaper compared to mining. The project focuses on the development of recycling of sintered NdFeB. We focus on hydrogen decrepitation and HDDR technologies for NdFeB magnets, while also consider alternatives. The input of the technological process is NdFeB collected from circulation and the output is a NdFeB semi-product that can be used in a sintered, bonded, ALD covered or 3D printed NdFeB industrially scalable production pot. The largest NdFeB plant in the EU is under construction in Narva. The methods developed in the project would help improve existing processes for circular economy.