STARTS Residencies

+ Challenge Immersive and Digital Narratives for Climate Change + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement Barcelona’s historically privileged geographical position is quickly turning into a challenging one: pollution, rising temperatures, and the threat of sea level rise, to name a few, are pressing problems, and to look away is no longer an option. How can

+ Challenge Designing the Robots of the Future + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement As a result of the aging population in Catalonia, the dependency ratio of the elderly will go from 28.9 in 2021 to 44.3 in 2040, and to 51.2 in 2070. As technology advances, robots will soon become ubiquitous in human environments.

+ Challenge Understanding and Engineering Photosynthesis for a More Sustainable Future + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement How does photosynthesis function at the molecular scale, and can we improve it? Unveiling the processes governing nanoscale energy transfer could advance sustainable agriculture, green energy, and carbon capture. We invite artists to support the scientific challenge of

+ Challenge Driving Agricultural Sustainability: Empowering Smallholder Farmers with Digital Transformation + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement How might we contribute to a more sustainable agriculture through digital transformation and a greater collaboration between smallholder farmers? + Keywords Agriculture, Sustainability, IoT Technology, AI, Efficiency, Collaboration, Farmers + Description Applicants are invited to collaborate with researchers

+ Challenge The Future of Computing + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement The growth of the bits -generated by our global information technology requires an increasing amount of energy for its processing and storage. In response artists and scientists are exploring the knowledge about organically stored information, looking into solutions that already exist in biology,

+ Challenge Regenerative AI for Urban Mining + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement How can we establish nurturing and circular relationships among the three different intelligences -human, artificial and natural- fostering collaborative symbiosis, allowing a “regenerative” AI to activate urban mining processes of materials and knowledge from the city environment? + Keywords Critical Minerals, Regenerative

+ Challenge Machine Sapiens and the City + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement How can we enhance the oracular power of AI to reveal the needs and the desires of the city and translate them into possible heuristic governance solutions that can improve its well-being and resilience? + Keywords Technomagic, Invisible cities, Intelligences interface, Heuristic

+ Challenge The Value of Care + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement While the utilisation of technologies holds the promise of significant transformation within the healthcare sector, such as personalised data-driven treatments, it also presents numerous critical challenges. These challenges encompass a range of concerns pertaining to human-robot interaction, privacy, data ownership and sharing, and

+ Challenge Where Our Food Comes From + Consortium Partner + Problem Statement How can we enhance transparency and collaboration in the Brussels food system, ensuring a seamless journey from farm to table? How can digital technologies be utilized to provide consumers with detailed information about the origin, production, and distribution of their food? +