Specific Challenge:

Innovation in manufacturing industries can be much faster, if materials modelling is used to focus experimental efforts. Novel modelling solutions need all determining components to be interwoven and available to the entire European community allowing the quick development and market deployment of new materials. Industry wants to know the risks and gains of materials modelling and the resources necessary to use the models efficiently. The industry needs education and/or support by translators analysing the industrial problems and proposing modelling solutions to the companies requesting this, supported by benchmarking. The above services need to be accompanied by tangible components like models, software packages, data, state of the art and connections to key actors. An open simulation platform providing interoperability between discrete and continuum models based on widely agreed communication standards would facilitate the use of materials modelling.

Scope:

The project should establish a web based marketplace linking various activities and databases on models, information on simulation tools, communities, expertise, course materials, lectures, seminars and tutorials for at least two manufacturing sectors of the European industry.

Projects should address sectors that in the design of materials and their manufacturing processes have common problems with models describing phenomena at, and ranging over, time and space scales spanning from femto-, pico-, nano- to the meso-scale.

The project should aim at agreement with the wide European scientific and industrial community a standard for organizing modeling data needed to make search and linking between different databases effective and easy. Strategies and test rules pertaining to data integrity and quality, e.g., by user and analytic feedback mechanisms should be established. The proposal should develop practical solutions for the ownership, control and management of distributed databases. The project should ensure wide spread participation.

The project should provide novel tangible avenues for integrating multiple materials models that can address industry relevant challenges. The project should establish methods for software interoperability that can later on be used for the integration of materials models (discrete and continuum applied at nanoscale) and databases in open simulation platforms. The development of homogenisation models and the elaboration of wrappers should be stimulated.

The proposal should establish a validation system to provide reliability and accuracy of models and for the comparison of results of simulations between materials models and for comparison with experiments.

The project should stimulate the exploitation of existing software via advice on modelling, education of companies and the stimulation of the provision of translation services especially for SMEs.

The proposal should present a credible business plan for the maintenance of the hub after the project duration.

Activities are expected to target Technology Readiness Level 6.

This topic is part of the open data pilot.

Funded proposals will be invited to participate in a cluster, to agree on metadata for the description of software and measurement tools and databases; to agree on software development standards; and to achieve seamless integration of their platforms across the different manufacturing-targeted application areas to achieve a true common marketplace. Projects are expected to contribute actively to on-going activities e.g. in the EMMC (European Materials Modelling Council), and EU funded clusters.

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU between EUR 5 and 8 million would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts.

Expected Impact:

• Increased innovation in industry based on materials modelling;
• Awareness of industry in general and SMEs in particular of the rapid progress of contemporary computational materials modelling tools, and increased use of materials modelling by the manufacturing companies (end-users);
• Broad, fast, and easy information management and exchange both between the modelling community and industry and within the modelling community;
• Ability for manufacturing companies (end-users) to do an effective search of numerical tools and/or providers of numerical simulations who could best suit their needs;
• Supply of software developers with comprehensive information about the potential clients and industrial tasks where numerical simulations would be highly desirable;
• Effective information exchange within the academic simulation community to enable faster general progress of material modelling methods;
• Speed up the use of materials modelling by standards and requirements of modelling data repositories including possibly data, modelling codes and validation repositories;
• Increased demand for data and materials models;
• Increase the use of materials simulation to comply with regulations;
• Rapid deployment of novel materials modelling solutions in particular manufacturing-targeted domains.