EU Research Research Articles

A Pact with the Third Sector. Between Co-Production and Civic Participation. The Italian Case

The co-creation/co-production paradigm received significant attention in the last decades from Public Administration managers, officials, and scholars as a viable tool to overcome the limits of the New Public Management framework. Some scholars recognise that co-creation can be the basis for building an alternative administration model called New Public Governance. Other research found that co-creation is an innovative practice in the social investment policy frame. A more recent EU research project examines the idea and practice of co-creation in public services informed by lived experience pilots in 10 European countries. This paper presents the Italian case as an example of an institutional configuration open to the citizens’ participation in the co-design of public services. The paper is organised as follows. In the first paragraph, we illustrate the recent development of the legislation concerning the participation of citizens and civil society organisations in designing and delivering public services and/or management of common goods. The second paragraph deals with a deep analysis of “grey material” and scientific publications concerning the history, evolution and future perspectives of the “Shared Administration” procedures. The third paragraph presents a case study of collaboration between citizens, Third Sector/Civil Society Organisations (TSO/CSO) and public administration at the local level (Municipality of Bologna). The conclusive paragraph summarises the key findings of our study.

Innovation and qualification of LEU research reactor fuels and materials

Two projects within the Euratom Research and Training Programmes 2014–2018 and 2019–2020 are focused on the innovation and qualification of novel nuclear fuels for conversion from highly-enriched uranium to low-enriched uranium (LEU) and for securing the supply chain of EU research reactors into the future. The LEU-FOREvER project is drawing to a close and has made significant progress in developing and demonstrating the uranium-molybdenum fuel system, demonstrating the viability of a high-density uranium-silicide fuel for EU high-performance research reactors (BR2, RHF, FRM-II, JHR). This project has significantly increased the fabrication know-how and fuel performance understanding of the uranium-molybdenum and high-density uranium-silicide dispersion fuel systems. Further, a new, innovative and increased performance design for the LVR-15 research reactor fuel assembly has been engineered and a demonstration is planned in 2022. In the EU-QUALIFY project, which began in 2020, the planning of four demonstration irradiation tests has been nearly completed and fabrication development of the various fuel systems is ongoing, including the establishment of an EU monolithic uranium-molybdenum fabrication capability. It is expected that the results of this project will begin or complete the data gathering necessary for generic fuel qualification of the LEU uranium-molybdenum dispersion and monolithic fuel systems, and the LEU high-density uranium-silicide fuel system.

Politika istraživanja i inovacija u Evropskoj Uniji i integracija Republike Srbije u reformisani evropski istraživački prostor

This paper addresses the subject of the EU research and innovation policy in the context of the European Research Area reform, with special focus on its external aspect. The first goal of this paper is to describe the leading developments in research and innovation which have taken place in the last decade, with emphasis on their significance for the EU integration process. Starting from Leuffen et al's concept of external differentiation, in this paper the ERA is considered a policy regime which expands beyond the EU borders. Consequently, the second goal of the paper is to present the Serbian research and innovation policy with respect to the ERA integration after the chapter on science and research was provisionally closed. Through thematic analysis of research and innovation strategies, this paper will discern if Serbian R&I policy converges with the priorities and guidelines of the new ERA, thus rendering it a part of the broader European research landscape.

The disconnect between the goals of trustworthy AI for law enforcement and the EU research agenda

In this paper, we investigate whether AI deployment for law enforcement will enable or impede the exercise of citizens' fundamental rights by juxtaposing the promises and policy goals with the crude reality of practices, funded projects, and practicalities of law enforcement. To this end, we map the projects funded by H2020 in AI for law enforcement and juxtapose them to the goals and aims of the EU in terms of Trustworthy AI and fundamental rights. We then bring forward existing research stressing that AI implementation in sensitive domains such as defense and law enforcement does not come without drawbacks, especially regarding discrimination, surveillance, data protection, and human dignity. We thoroughly analyze and assess human-centric and socially-driven lens risks and threats of using AI factors from an ethical, legal, and societal perspective (ELSA), including organizational and gender worries.

Voicing challenges: GDPR and AI research

EU data protection rules could be difficult for researchers to navigate, particularly when processing massive datasets containing personal data for Artificial Intelligence (AI) developments. This article examines how data protection intersects with AI research to elucidate the issues arising from the use of large-scale databases containing personal data to train, test and validate AI systems. The key objectives of this work are to (1) scrutinise the data protection requirements and limits for the processing of personal data in AI research, (2) reflect on possible complications regarding data quality requirements for trustworthy AI and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance, and (3) present possible ways forward to reconcile GDPR requirements and AI research. While reviewing and mapping relevant provisions and guidance, we identify data protection challenges posed by the use of massive databases containing personal data for AI research. The findings suggest that, while the legal regime for research under the GDPR resolves some of the challenges identified, others, such as legal basis for processing and processing of special categories of data, remain unaddressed. We argue that the nature of these complications will make it difficult for EU researchers to advance in trustworthy AI efforts. The analysis concludes by suggesting possible ways to tackle the remaining issues.

Best application of low-cost enhancement treatment for agricultural drain wastewater

This study aimed to apply a new technique of treatment inside stream using polyethylene sheets strips as a very cheap method for enhancing the quality of agriculture wastewater to meet the irrigation reuse needs. The study was carried out on a pilot plant that was constructed by EU research project named “drains water quality enhancement” inside Faqous Wastewater Treatment plant nearby Bahr El Bakar agricultural drain in El Sharqiyah Governorate, Egypt. Polyethylene strips were used as in stream media treatment where the operation program was made to determine the best positioning for applied serial lines to achieve the target water quality for reuse purposes, The study used four intervals first was 30 cm in channel 2 ,the second was 70cm in channel 3, the third was 100cm in channel 4 ,and the fourth was 150 cm in channel 5 to get the best enhancing efficiency and the removal ratios for Biochemical Oxygen demand (BOD), Chemical Oxygen demand( COD) & Heavy metals (HM). Each channel contains six serial curtain lines to determine the study parameters. The results showed that the first interval 30 cm achieved removal ratios 44.6 %for BOD, 27 %for COD, and 41.7% for HM, while interval 70 cm produced removal ratios 46 %for BOD, 27.7 %for COD, and 43.3% for HM, for the third interval 100 cm the study get the removal ratios 51.6 %for BOD, 30 %for COD, and 46 % for HM, and finally for interval 150 cm the resulted removal ratio were 52.6 %for BOD, 30.5 %for COD, and 48 % for HM. The study proved that the curtain lines interval should be equal to or more than double the water depth in the stream to achieve higher removal efficiency in all measured parameters.

FIPs and Practice

FIPs and Practice

P.35 Genetic newborn screening and digital technologies to accelerate rare disease diagnosis: The EU-IMI screen4Care project

Between 5000 and 8000 rare diseases (RDs) affect the daily lives of around 30 million people in the EU, representing a significant challenge for the healthcare system and society. RDs patients often experience long and burdensome path to diagnosis, possible misdiagnosis, or improper treatment, which may be due to low prevalence of RDs, high number of different diseases and the lack of general sensibleness. It is estimated that 72% of RDs are genetic and 70% have an exclusively paediatric onset. Strategies for genetic newborn screening (NBS) are thus of pivotal importance, since an early RDs diagnosis would radically change their clinical history. Screen4Care (S4C), a new EU Research Project, is a public-private collaboration of 35 partners led by the University of Ferrara and including 21 academic partners, 9 industrial project partners -led by Pfizer-, 4 small and medium-sized enterprises and EURORDIS. S4C -that will last five years- offers an innovative research approach to accelerate rare disease diagnosis, through two central pillars: genetic NBS and artificial intelligence (AI)-based tools such as machine learning. The first central pillar, genetic NBS, will adopt different strategies interrogating: I) currently treatable RDs (TREAT-panel-approach), II) actionable RDs (ACT-panel-approach); III) and whole genome sequencing (WGS) will be offered to symptomatic patients when NBS resulted negative. Moreover, S4C aims to use the power of innovative digital solutions to shorten time to diagnosis via two routes: I) predictive algorithms, leveraging the Screen4Care data (federated) machine learning environment and embedded electronic health record (EHR) systems; II) a repository of AI "symptom checkers", which will be designed to facilitate self-diagnosis and/or to suggest referral pathways to physicians for diagnostic workup. S4C aims to shorten the path to RDs diagnosis with this dual approach and to establish a digital infrastructure for families and health workers.

Built in, not bolted on: responsible innovation in UK Centres for Doctoral Training – the new normal?

PurposeThe purpose of the study detailed here was to engage with Directors of Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs) during the first year of their new Centres to form a snapshot view of the nature and type of training that was being incorporated and how this might affect the wider institution – in this case the university. Using an organisational learning lens, this paper empirically examines the work-in-progress of the responsible innovation (RI) training in CDTs to assess how new RI understandings are being created, retained and transferred within the CDTs, questioning whether this process represents a programme of “institutionalisation”.Design/methodology/approachDuring the past decade, RI has become increasingly embedded within the EU and UK research context, appearing with greater frequency in funding calls and policy spaces. As part of this embedding, in its 2018 funding call for CDTs, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) required RI training to be included in the programme for all doctoral students.FindingsThe paper concludes that, at present, institutionalisation is highly variegated, with the greater organisational change required to truly embed RI mindsets.Originality/valueThe paper provides original, empirical research evidence of RI institutionalisation in UK CDTs, and, using a “learning organisation” lens, examines areas of value to both RI and learning organisation theory.

Reflections about handling interview data from third countries at European universities: Collaboration opportunities and/or risky business for participants and researchers?

Through reflections about a case study concerning an unfeasible, planned research study on nurses’ working days during the COVID-19 pandemic, the article aims to describe and discuss legal and ethical challenges when conducting European-based research together with nurses in third countries. The article highlights how the General Data Protection Regulation challenges EU and non-EU research collaborations and research across borders in healthcare research. Digitally recorded interview data can be traced, putting both research participants and researchers at risk in relation to confidentiality, safety and potential critical views by national regimes. This raises ethical claims for research collaborations between EU and third countries and hampers the possibilities to make silent voices discernible through research. It is a questionable solution both to collaborate and not to collaborate with third countries such as China. Further reflections on the ways forward to facilitate research collaboration between EU and third countries are needed.

The notion of justice in funded research on urban sustainability: performing on a postpolitical stage or staging the political?

ABSTRACT Urban sustainability has often been accused of tending mostly to its environmental and economic dimensions, neglecting or marginalising issues of justice. Simultaneously, the European Union has been increasingly funding research explicitly focused on the intersection of justice, sustainability and the city. The role of such research in furthering or jeopardising just urban sustainability objectives and outcomes so far remains underexplored. We conducted a discourse analysis on 27 selected research projects funded by the EU FP7 and Horizon 2020 schemes and which focus on the themes of urban sustainability and justice, supplemented by qualitative interviews with core researchers in those projects, to examine their potential in (re-)politicising or depoliticising urban sustainability. Our findings indicate that justice is often loosely defined through terms such as “stakeholder participation,” “inclusion,” or “diversity” in urban sustainability interventions, and research projects fail to pay attention to structural and historical drivers of injustice within a broader context of political economy, society and culture. We find this trend mostly in international collaborative projects that are implementation-oriented and promise to fast track inter- or trans-disciplinarity within a context of precarious research contracts and limited timescales for researchers. We build on earlier critiques of the ecological modernist character of EU research and policy priorities and contribute further by demonstrating how the academic entrepreneurial system perpetrated by EU-funded projects can undermine the politicising possibilities of research. To overcome funding constraints, we urge funders to allow for broader methods and timescales to examine and reflect on what are, or could be, just urban sustainabilities.

H2020 projects and EU research needs for nature-based adaptation solutions

This paper investigates the documentation produced by 21 Horizon 2020 (H2020) projects for the use of Nature Based Solutions (NBS) for climate change adaptation (NBaS). Accordingly, an updated state-of-the-art on current knowledge and its limits is presented. Findings are then capitalized on for highlighting research needs. The main objective of this study is to inform future orientations on NBaS research. Accordingly, it can be considered as an effort to complement the 2021 European strategy for climate change adaptation, under which NBaS is listed as one of the three cross-cutting priorities. The obtained results reflect actual outcomes from completed projects, while ongoing projects provided a substantial amount of relevant knowledge. From the exhaustive knowledge-research need inventory, one of the most significant identified gaps was the need for developing further the fundamental scientific basis behind these solutions, as the concept favors its practical nature and places less emphasis on its scientific counterpart.

Position paper on management of personal data in environment and health research in Europe.

Management of datasets that include health information and other sensitive personal information of European study participants has to be compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR, Regulation (EU) 2016/679). Within scientific research, the widely subscribed'FAIR' data principles should apply, meaning that research data should be findable, accessible, interoperable and re-usable. Balancing the aim of open science driven FAIR data management with GDPR compliant personal data protection safeguards is now a common challenge for many research projects dealing with (sensitive) personal data. In December 2020 a workshop was held with representatives of several large EU research consortia and of the European Commission to reflect on how to apply the FAIR data principles for environment and health research (E&H). Several recent data intensive EU funded E&H research projects face this challenge and work intensively towards developing solutions to access, exchange, store, handle, share, process and use such sensitive personal data, with the aim to support European and transnational collaborations. As a result, several recommendations, opportunities and current limitations were formulated. New technical developments such as federated data management and analysis systems, machine learning together with advanced search software, harmonized ontologies and data quality standards should in principle facilitate the FAIRification of data. To address ethical, legal, political and financial obstacles to the wider re-use of data for research purposes, both specific expertise and underpinning infrastructure are needed. There is a need for the E&H research data to find their place in the European Open Science Cloud. Communities using health and population data, environmental data and other publicly available data have to interconnect and synergize. To maximize the use and re-use of environment and health data, a dedicated supporting European infrastructure effort, such as the EIRENE research infrastructure within the ESFRI roadmap 2021, is needed that would interact with existing infrastructures.

Enabling Decentralized and Auditable Access Control for IoT through Blockchain and Smart Contracts

The increase in the interconnection of physical devices and the emergence of the 5 G paradigm foster the generation and distribution of massive amounts of data. The complexity associated with the management of these data requires a suitable access control approach that empowers citizens to control how their data are shared, so potential privacy issues can be mitigated. While well-known access control models are widely used in web and cloud scenarios, the IoT ecosystem needs to address the requirements of lightness, decentralization, and scalability to control the access to data generated by a huge number of heterogeneous devices. This work proposes CapBlock, a design that integrates a capability-based access control model and blockchain technology for a fully distributed evaluation of authorization policies and generation of access credentials using smart contracts. CapBlock is intended to manage the access to information in federated IoT environments where data need to be managed through access control policies defined by different data providers. The feasibility of CapBlock has been successfully evaluated in the scope of the EU research project IoTCrawler, which aims at building a secure search engine for IoT data in large-scale scenarios.

In the path for creating Research-to-business new opportunities on green hydrogen between Italy and Brazil

On September 22, 2021, 5 experts from Brazil and 5 from Italy discussed the future of research-to-business (R2B) cooperation between Italy and Brazil on green hydrogen (H2) and related technologies. The workshop discussed some priorities of the Brazilian policies and elucidated the strengths and the weaknesses of the biggest economy among the Latin American countries. Because of its territorial and underground resources its social and economic activities, Brazil offers an excellent basin for supporting an H2-based economy. A well-established connection between Brazilian Universities and EU research organisations already exists in up-to-date research activities and frameworks for grants programmes. Nevertheless, Brazil has some difficulties creating new economies through the industrialisation of research achievements. On the other hand, Italy has a long tradition of creating and exporting technologies because its enterprises are generally prone to creating new business.In this communication, we reported the argued discussions between Brazilian and Italian players on green hydrogen that discussed how to improve the technological interaction between the two countries. This meeting discussed the entire value chain for green hydrogen, from the production to the end-user, and included distribution and commercialisation of green H2 and related technologies.

Doctoral Studies in the Context of the Bologna Process: Industrial Doctorates in Greece

There is a major shift, recently, in the structure, content and even the very focus of doctoral studies in Europe - both for universities and students themselves. In the context of the Bologna Process, at the Berlin meeting in 2003, ministers responsible for higher education in the Member States agreed to place doctoral studies at the service of the effort to achieve the EU's research objectives, acting as a link between the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) and the European Research Area (ERA), with the aim to serving the overarching economic purpose. Accordingly, in this paper, we will attempt, first of all, to highlight recent changes in doctoral studies in Europe and describe the corresponding developments in Greek legislation. Finally, we will focus on a very recent trend concerning doctoral studies in Greece: industrial doctorates

Chief Medical Officers meeting on implementing a public health genomics approach

During the Italian Presidency of the Council of European Union, on October, 2014, the Italian Ministry of Health invited the Chief Medical Officers in Rome for a meeting on the European policies of public health genomics. Following reports on the current policies of public health genomics in Italy and Europe, the policy implications for health systems of advancements in genomics were discussed. Specifically, participants at the CMOs’ Meeting acknowledged the challenge faced in effectively and responsibly integrating genomics into public health research, policy and practice. Additionally, the participants agreed that the translation process need to be supported by empirical evidence of effectiveness and cost-effectiveness. The participants agreed that the application of genome-based technologies and information for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases of public health significance still holds a great promise. These advances also raise certain ethical, legal and social issues concerning the potential of genomics to undermine the collectivistic approach in public health and thus equity. The CMOs also acknowledge the importance of research on genomics to improve patienttargeted care and for technological development in EU Member States, and appreciate the role that EU research programs can contribute to this field. • Those present also argued that public health professionals and those who are responsible for designing health systems should engage with the genomics agenda in order to ensure proper balance, and to make policy makers aware of its relevance; • That the financial burden imposed by genomic-related technologies has the potential to overwhelm the available resources for health systems and to broaden health inequalities, highlighting the need for careful planning; • Member States could, in line with their-own national policies on health, take additional steps to: develop and implement comprehensive strategies or plans in the field, also (1) Section of Hygiene-Institute of Public Health-Faculty of

‘Closer to the Market’: EU Research Governance and Symbolic Power

AbstractAdding to vital debates in EU Studies about the executive power of European governance, this article analyses the influence of EU research funding in the social sciences. The standardization and enforcement of norms, principles, and language codes, we argue, play a crucial role in EU governance. Applying a mixed‐method approach, we show that mastery of the ‘EU language game’ does more than help scholars obtain EU funding; it also generates individual and disciplinary frictions, since it requires a subtle re‐orientation of social‐scientific research towards political goals. Our study sheds light on strategies used by scientists who find themselves enmeshed in this language game, from euphoric adaptation to reluctant lip service. Since these academic strategies play out in the relative autonomy of liberal EU governance, the explicit focus on market integration is accompanied by a less explicit interest in matters of political representation and identity formation.

Data Protection Legislation in the Area of Health Research in EU

Data Protection Legislation in the Area of Health Research in EU

Data Protection Legislation in the Area of Health Research in EU

There are strict regulations and restrictions in the European legislation about personal data and medical information, collected from the patients. Some of the legal requirements have recently been implemented and still confuse medical and research circles and insufficient information of doctors about what is allowed and what is not. On the other hand, physicians and researches need to use data for the development of the medical science, in interaction with other physicians and medical institutions, for statistics, prevention, and public health, for clinical trials, est. The aim of the current survey is to highlight some areas of the Data Protection Legislation that are particularly relevant to the area of health research.