Objective
"The recent revolution in generative AI is powered by the ever-growing scale of Foundation Models (FMs). This, however, causes a series of harmful ramifications, such as their unsustainable energy demand and environmental pollution, which accelerate climate change. Moreover, the scale of FMs jeopardises data privacy, as it compels users to deploy them on third-party servers rather than edge devices. AToM-FM sets out to reverse this trend by remedying a fundamental source of inefficiency in FMs: the granularity of the ""atomic"" units for representing information in current FMs is fixed, as it entirely depends on how they update their memory and segment input data (a process known as tokenization). Instead, AToM-FMs will couple their granularity with the complexity of each task, allocating only as much computing effort as needed. As its key technical breakthrough, AToM-FM will make memory and tokenization adaptive, elevating FMs to unprecedented levels of efficiency. To facilitate the swift adoption of this new technology, I will repurpose state-of-the-art FMs into adaptive architectures and release them to the public. This will not only drastically cut the carbon footprint of FM deployment and uphold data privacy, but also foster the emergence of new FM capabilities. In fact, compressing the FM representations will effectively broaden their horizon, i.e. the amount of input and output they can perceive and generate, respectively, without exhausting their memory. This will unlock 1) permanent memories, which are a prerequisite for lifelong learning; 2) longer reasoning chains, perfecting the mathematical and planning skills of FMs; 3) modality-agnostic and fine-grained inputs, facilitating the integration of low-resource modalities and grounding agentive FMs onto physical spaces. Overall, AToM-FM's ambitious agenda will usher in the next generation of FMs, paving the way for efficient and long-horizon AI."
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been validated by the project's team.
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2025-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
EH8 9YL Edinburgh
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.