digital – Progress in Research

Digital Care: emerging care models, new players and future relationships

Posted on 05/07/202306/08/2024 by Erik Franco

On Wednesday 28 June, the results of the research project Cura Digitale (Digital Care), conducted by D\Tank, the think tank of the Department of Design of Politecnico di Milano, were presented at the Gianfranco Ferré Research Centre.

The pandemic has accelerated digitisation processes in the healthcare sector, prompting users to make greater use of online services, for instance to keep specific problems under control (diabetes, heart disease, insomnia, etc.) or to adopt a healthier, more balanced lifestyle.

A group of researchers from the Department of Design investigated the topic of Digital Care through the four main tools – research of scientific articles, exploration of patents, user analysis and discussion with decision-makers – with the aim of outlining a shared trajectory towards equitable, accessible and inclusive digital care.

Three relevant themes emerged from the research – Distributed Care, Self-Care and Health Booster Technologies – which can be considered as three different areas of design. Each area has been declined to the Present, the Possible Future and the Alternative Present to identify convergences and references useful for the realisation of strategies, products, services and places of Digital Care.

Cura Digitale on the D\Tank website

New European doctoral network GreenDigiPharma

Posted on 31/01/202306/08/2024 by Erik Franco

Forming a group of European PhD students specialized in the development of sustainable production methods for the pharmaceutical sector – this is the goal of GreenDigiPharma (“Green and digital continuous-flow pharmaceutical manufacturing”), the new “doctoral network” financed by the European Commission within the Marie Skłodowska-Curie programme, and coordinated by prof. Gianvito Vilé, researcher at the “Giulio Natta” Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering of the Politecnico di Milano.

Therefore, the purpose of GreenDigiPharma is to create a group of highly qualified PhDs that will operate in the academic as well as in the industrial world to introduce new skills, fundamental to guide the green and digital transformation of pharmaceutical production.

GreenDigiPharma will train the leaders of tomorrow in the pharmaceutical industry, who will propose innovative solutions able to simultaneously increase the productivity of this sector, improve its competitiveness and reduce its environmental impact.
Professor Gianfranco Vilé, coordinator of GreenDigiPharma

In addition to the Politecnico di Milano, the project involves 9 other European universities, 8 industrial partners and a research body.

The role of digitalization in supporting the industrial circular transition

Posted on 23/05/202206/08/2024 by Erik Franco

The project “The role of digitalization in supporting the industrial circular transition” has won a grant of 10,000 euros as a T.I.M.E. project.

The project aims at investigating the relationship between the adoption of digital technologies and the implementation of circular economy practices within the industrial sector. Its aim is to understand the supporting role offered by the digital technologies, passing from the enhancement and generation of dynamic capabilities. This would be done by conducting an international survey, providing empirical-based insights.

The coordinator of the project is the Politecnico di Milano, Department of Management Economic and Industrial Engineering, with Dr. Alessandra Neri as principal investigator. KTH Royal Institute of Technology (Sweden) and Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (Spain) are partners of the project and members of the T.I.M.E. Association. The University of the West of England (UK) and Aston University (UK) take part in the project as external members.

The T.I.M.E. Association (Top International Managers in Engineering), founded in 1989, is a network of leading technical universities and engineering schools in Europe and all over the world, with a strong international dimension in teaching, research and industrial relations. The association currently consists of 57 members in 25 countries, and the Politecnico di Milano is a member of the Advisory Committee.

Besides double degree activities, T.I.M.E. promotes a series of other initiatives, including the T.I.M.E. projects, through which the association co-finances new or existing initiatives between member universities, in which T.I.M.E. can represent an added value.

In search of the perfect sound: the case of the stradivarius violins

Posted on 09/05/202206/08/2024 by Erik Franco

A multidisciplinary team coordinated by the CNR engaged seventy violin makers in a listening experiment to compare and evaluate the sound qualities of four violins: two modern, one factory and one Stradivarius. The results, published in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, suggest that what makes the Stradivarius the most pleasant sound is a particular balance in the properties of the violin’s timbre.

The experiment was conducted by Carlo Andrea Rozzi from the Cnr Nanoscience Institute, Alessandro Voltini from the ‘A. Stradivari’ International School of Violin Making in Cremona, Fabio Antonacci from the Politecnico di Milano, Massimo Nucci and Massimo Grassi from the University of Padua.

The researchers used a very simple sound stimulus, the musical scale, so that the judgements were guided only by the timbre of the violin and not by other factors such as ‘liking/disliking’ a particular piece of music. Based solely on five notes, the listeners showed a marked preference for one particular violin, the Stradivarius. The researchers then identified a kind of ‘signature’ that distinguishes the preferred violin sound from those considered less pleasant. Thanks to an in-depth analysis of the descriptions provided by the listeners and vibro-acoustic measurements made on the instruments, they were able to describe the preferred sound as one that has a particular balance of ‘openness’, ‘clarity’ and ‘nasality’.

Establishing which aspects of the sound contribute to making the timbre of an instrument pleasant is important for violin making, as it paves the way for the creation of instruments with desired timbral properties. The vibratory measurements made on these violins also have the purpose of building, in the future, a data repository that enables the relationship to be estimated between the way the instrument vibrates and the timbre,
Dr. Fabio Antonacci.

The experiment was conducted in the name of excellence: thanks to the support of the Municipality of Cremona, the researchers had access to violins from the Historical collection of the Cremona Violin Museum and the excellent acoustics of the Auditorium room for listening tests.

The study online

Cover image: Historical violins from the collection at the Antonio Stradivari Violin Museum, ‘Scrigno dei Tesori’ room. Credit: Museo del Violino 2020 © Cristian Chiodelli for Museo del Violino

DC4DM Project

Posted on 20/01/202206/08/2024 by Erik Franco

Digital Creativity for developing Digital Maturity future skills (DC4DM) is the three-year research project funded by the European Commission under the Erasmus+ Programme. Its main objective is to implement, apply and disseminate the DC4DM educational model to develop and empower digital creative abilities to strategically drive the application of future emerging digital technologies in any field.

Shared within a European network of HEIs, SMEs and Startups, Business Incubators, the DC4DM model will train talents that will enable companies to achieve digital maturity. They will become Digital Maturity Enablers.

Design, with its human-centred approach, plays a key role in this transformation. As researchers and educators, we must update our educational models and train the necessary skills so that our students are able to strategically address the future social and environmental challenges of the future by exploiting the opportunities offered by emerging digital technologies, keeping people at the centre.
Project Coordinator Marita Canina, Associate Professor and scientific head of the research lab IDEActivity Centre

The DC4DM model, developed considering the main Digitally Mature company’s needs, promotes the development and empowerment of creativity, design and entrepreneurial skills with tools and methods to adapt and advance new collaborative practices, integrating digital technologies, creative process and design in order to boost employability, and companies’ competitiveness and innovation potential, in different contexts of application. For each identified need, the model integrates the specific set of skills defined as Digital Creative Abilities (DCA) that empower people to express their creative potential and think and act in a non-predictable digital world. The skills included in the model are structured along different dimensions, among these, the Digital Sustainability and Responsibility become therefore a pillar on which the model is based. This dimension includes the future, ethical and sustainable thinking skills relevant when designing for uncertain digital futures.

The project main outcome will be an educational box that includes the action model and the tools and methods to train cross-functional teams of design, engineer, business students to face the complex real-world challenges brought by digital transformation.

The ongoing digital evolution is having a strong impact on every sector of our society, creating opportunities and threats that need to be strategically addressed and managed.

The consortium, coordinated by Prof. Marita Canina, Associate Professor at the Department of Design and scientific head of the research lab IDEActivity Centre, includes 4 universities from 3 EU countries – Politecnico di Milano (IT), Universitè Jean Monnet Saint-Etienne (FR), Institut Mines-Telecom (FR), Universidade de Madeira (PT) – and one business incubator – Startup Madeira (PT).

Home page del progetto DC4DM

Pagina del progetto Erasmus+