At Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) Coordinator Laurens H.J. Schwiebert introduced the international group of Live Baltic Campus to the TU/e Smart Cities Center Eindhoven (SCC/e) on 8th of March 2016. The focus of the SCC/e is in line with the definition of Smart Cities used by European Union: “how to best design and adapt cities into smart, intelligent and sustainable environments where living is comfortable”. Primary focus of the SCC/e is on cities and urban areas and the key innovation fields are Energy, Smart Mobility, Health and ICT/Data Science. The primary goal of the Smart Cities Center is to do research through project based collaborations with all relevant Quadruple Helix stakeholders – university, business, public sector and society/citizens – as well as societal application of the research results in Living Lab situations.
Program Manager Ben Rutten talked about Living Lab Smart Mobility. Smart Mobility at TU/e focuses on technological solutions to societal problems like emissions, traffic jams and accidents by preventing unnecessary transport and making the necessary mobility more sustainable. An example of this is solar energy family car Stella invented at the automotive lab of TU/e. Meet Stella Lux!
Director of the TU/e Sports Centre Wim Koch told us how the operation of the Student Sport Center is all about connecting people: Center creates opportunities for events and meetings. One can even cultivate vegetables on the campus! The cultural and social program is also meant for the companies operating on the campus, there is e.g. Get-in-Touch Spouses Program for the firms. Campus of TU/e is open for the citizens of Eindhoven: they can come to play for instance football on the campus. In addition, the Student Sport Center runs a program called WellCommUNITY. Within this program all the students are analyzed and they are being helped to develop their skills, e.g. leading skills, through their studies.
The Department of Industrial Design focuses on the design of intelligent systems, products and related services in a societal context, addressing aspects such as adaptive behavior, context awareness and highly dynamic interaction. Dean of the Department Aarnout Brombacher talked about the health research which is done with real people in real context, e.g. during the Eindhoven Marathon.
Photos: Katariina Saarela
