Identifying the emerging grand challenges in ICST - an initiative for the ERCIM members

Call for Participation

ERCIM is planning to initiate an activity aimed at contributing to the future landscape in ICST. The objective of this activity is to identify the emerging grand challenges in our field and to define the strategic research topics and roadmaps needed in order to achieve the high-impact results necessary to meet these challenges.

This activity should be in the spirit of the earlier ERCIM-led EC projects “Beyond the Horizon” and “Interlink”, but on a smaller scale. The intention is that by acting as a focal point of expertise and vision, ERCIM will continue to be considered a key institution by the European Commission.

As a starting point, it was decided to focus on the fields of “Big Data Analytics” and “Security and Privacy”. The expected output should be white papers for the areas under study. The mechanism to reach this goal could be by means of targeted workshops and on-line consultations in which experts in the relevant fields participate.

The initiative should be carried out primarily by expert groups comprising researchers from ERCIM partners (roughly 4-6 people per group). The groups may be complemented by experts from non-ERCIM-institutes having key expertise in the areas under examination. Deliverables should be ready for distribution around October 2014.

ERCIM is willing to fund travel and organizing costs to set-up such workshops. A maximum of 20k€ per action is available. It is expected that two actions will be funded.

Experts from ERCIM members institutes are invited to participate in this activity and submit a proposal for an expert group in either of the two fields mentioned above. Proposals should be brief (no longer than 2 pages), and should list the names of the experts, the field of the activity, the proposed way forward and provide an estimate of the costs (actual costs, e.g. travel and subsistence) that will be requested for reimbursement by ERCIM.

Proposals should be submitted to Dimitris Plexousakis (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.), Chair of the ERCIM Science Task Gtroup, and (in cc) to Domenico Laforenza, ERCIM President (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.), before February 17, 2014.

The proposals will be reviewed by the ERCIM board with advice from the Science Task Group, and subject to approval by the ERCIM EEIG Board of Directors.