Fraunhofer Center for Assistive Information and Communication Solutions – AICOS
“With the help of cutting-edge technology, ethical AI and the Horizon Europe Programme, we will beat diseases like cancer and support our healthcare sector”
10.05.2021
Unique and distinctive technologies led the European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, Mariya Gabriel, to visit three Portuguese institutions, including the Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS research center (FhP-AICOS). The visit took place last 8th of May.
“Today, we will talk about intelligence in a trustworthy way”, revealed Liliana Ferreira, Director of the Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS and host of the event. Accountable and trustworthy Artificial Intelligence, co-designing digital technology, rapid prototyping to impact people’s lives (ex. cervical cancer), were the key topics of the visit. FhP-AICOS has been investing a great effort on research and development on these subjects, namely Artificial Intelligence, and the numerous use and application to several different areas such as health and Industry 4.0.
Involved and captivated by the themes addressed, the committee was very interested, not only in the technologies presented, but also in understanding its path and evolution, the way it will expand. “Honoured to visit the Research Center Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, in Porto. With the help of cutting-edge technology, ethical AI and the Horizon Europe Programme, we will beat diseases like cancer and support our healthcare sector”, stated Mariya Gabriel, who also made a plea “Let’s continue cooperating in science!”.
A new generation of cyber-physical and artificial intelligence systems aimed at supporting medical decision and the development - ethical and human-centered - of industrial technologies were presented. FhP-AICOS’ researchers are developing a modular platform to support the certification of Artificial Intelligence applications based on a 'blockchain' structure, which allows to track the entire process, from the data that was used to train the algorithms to the exact version of the model that is used in each decision. Its applications in health and medicine, namely in supporting the diagnosis of cervical cancer, as well as in solutions that ensure the well-being (physical and mental) of industry workers in their work environment, enabling companies to digitization and competitiveness in the sector, were demonstrated during the visit.
The visit’s committee was composed of the European Commissioner, Mariya Gabriel; the Minister of Science, Manuel Heitor; the President of the North Regional Commission (CCDR-N), António Cunha; the President of the Portuguese Innovation Agency (ANI), Joana Mendonça; the vice president of the Porto Municipality, Filipe Araújo; the elected Rector of the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, Emídio Gomes; and the Vice-Rector for Research and Development from the University of Évora, António Candeias.