ERA Chair for Computational Imaging and Processing in High Resolution

Project Information

CIPHR

Grant agreement ID: 857627

DOI

10.3030/857627

Project closed

EC signature date 8 July 2019

Start date 1 October 2019

End date 31 December 2025

Funded under

• Establishing ‚ERA Chairs’

Total cost

€ 2 499 818,75

EU contribution

€ 2 499 818,75

Coordinated by

TARTU ULIKOOL
Estonia

Periodic Reporting for period 3 - CIPHR (ERA Chair for Computational Imaging and Processing in High Resolution)

Reporting period: 2024-02-01 to 2025-12-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The CIPHR project aimed to establish the Center of Photonics and Computational Imaging (CPCI), a research unit within the University of Tartu (UTARTU) that will become a world leader in computational imaging, a sub-field of photonics. The CIPHR project created a top-level research team capable of conducting cutting-edge research that combined photonics with computer science and optoelectronics. The project connected strong scientific fields in UTARTU, such as optics and spectroscopy, machine vision, advanced manufacturing, electronics, and informatics. It enabled the group to thrive further by combining expertise and resources to investigate complex multidisciplinary problems.

The mission of the CIPHR research group was to extend the boundaries of knowledge and provide innovative solutions and cutting-edge research results in the field of computational imaging. The vision of the Group was to become a prominent international research centre and a leader in computational imaging in Estonia and Europe.

The CIPHR research group increased the number of team members and expanded research facilities and equipment. The CIPHR Group has many international collaborators all over the world in academic and industry sectors contributing to academic research and product development, respectively.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The ERA Chair holder has recruited a team of researchers to conduct top level research in the field of photonics. All staff was recruited in full compliance with European Charter for Researchers and EU Code of Conduct for the recruitment of researchers. The ERA Chair holder assessed the research environment and established contacts with other research units in the University of Tartu.

The CIPHR group did not have experimental resources during the first year 2022 due to the time-consuming public procurement process. However, with the help of internal and external collaborators, a reasonable number of research outputs were generated during the first year. During the first year, the CIPHR group has published more than 15 scientific articles in reputed journals, international conference proceedings and a book chapter. From November 2022 to January 2024, the CIPHR group obtained vital scientific equipment such as spatial light modulator, light sources and image sensors and began more independent research. During the second year, until January 2024, the CIPHR group has published 22 journal articles, 22 conference proceedings, one book and two book chapters. After that the CIPHR group focused on publishing high quality works and has published around 50 scientific articles in reputed scientific journals.

CIPHR Research Group members presented 35 oral and 13 poster presentations at prestigious international scientific conferences like the Imaging and Applied Optics Congress of Optica, SPIE Optics + Optoelectronics conference, IEEE international conferences. All the presentations were published in international conference proceedings. The CIPHR team members won many awards for best oral presentations. During the past two years, the CIPHR team members have won the prestigious Three minute competition prizes representing the institute of physics.

Some of CIPHR group’s research outputs were recognized as important inventions in the field and highlighted in science news outlets such as Phys. Org, IEEE Spectrum News, Eureka Alert, Science Magazine, Science Blog, Bioengineering news, Wiley Analytical Science News and Estonian National News. One of the research outputs was selected by the technology transfer office of University of Tartu and an US patent has been filed and published. Additional patents will be filed from the ongoing research projects.

The CIPHR group members organized events such as two international summer schools, two international conferences with one online only and another regular international conference along with Springer Nature with participants from all over the world, two hackathons, workshops, and seminars to attract more researchers and collaborations.

The CIPHR chair team has an extensive domestic and international collaboration network. CIPHR group is now planning to expand the network towards the US.

To publicize and disseminate the work done in CIPHR group, we have a website https://cpci.voog.com/ and social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube channel.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Impacts by the ERA Chair programme for UTARTU include:
1. Increased attractiveness of UTARTU and Estonia for internationally excellent, mobile researchers. It is expected that by the end of CIPHR project in 2025 we have doubled the number of foreign researchers working in computational imaging. Before the project started in 2019 there were 2 foreign researchers working in computational imaging in UTARTU. By the end of second reporting period there were three foreign researchers and four foreign PhD students (junior researchers) working in the field of computational imaging in UTARTU.

2. Increased research excellence of institution in specific fields covered by the ERA Chair holder. By the end of CIPHR project in 2025 we exceeded the goals set in the proposal far beyond - two computational imaging proofs of concepts and one algorithm/prototype, at least 10 articles are accepted for publication in targeted high impact journals and three collaboration agreements with companies have to been signed. By the end of the project, one algorithm is worked out, and work on two computational imaging proofs of concepts has been completed. There are around 50 articles published in reputed journals from the beginning of the project. One collaboration agreement with Karl Storz Video Endoscopy Estonia was signed.

3. Improved capability of UTARTU to compete successfully for international research funding. It is expected that by the end of the project in 2025 the number of submitted research proposals involving photonics or computational imaging in which UTARTU is a partner will increase from the previous five-year period (2014-2019) by 60% and in which UTARTU is the principal investigator by 40%. By the end of the project, four MSCA proposals were submitted and one crossed the threshold, one Australian Government grant has been funded, two Australian Synchrotron beam time grants have been funded, two European travel grants were financed. The ERC Consolidator Grant was submitted, ENLIGHT grant was submitted, Feasibility grant from Tartu University has been funded, EIC Pathfinder Open Grant and Estonian PRG grant submitted by us crossed the threshold.

4. Institutional changes at UTARTU to implement the ERA priorities. It is expected that CIPHR project have impact to gender balance, increase of peer reviewed publications and high-quality doctoral training for 5 PhD students. The CIPHR project has impact on gender balance - four out of 5 PhD students are female. There has been a considerable increase in peer-reviewed publications and high-quality training for PhD students.

One of CIPHR directions is work on novel imaging technologies based on chaos