14.05.2021

TU Ilmenau relies on artificial intelligence

Ilmenau University of Technology is stepping up its research activities in the fields of artificial intelligence and data science. At the university and under the umbrella of the Thuringian Center for Learning Systems and Robotics at TU Ilmenau, a whole range of research projects are being carried out that transfer human thinking and learning to computer systems in order to make everyday life more effective, more comfortable and safer. In the future, the Ilmenau researchers will benefit from an extremely powerful high-performance computer, which will go into operation in a few days and will make it possible to carry out research projects in which enormous amounts of data have to be processed.

In the Thuringian Center for Learning Systems and Robotics (TZLR), TU Ilmenau coordinates all activities of Thuringian universities and research institutes in the fields of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, big data and robotics under one roof. The transfer project thuringian AI - thurAI for short, where "AI" stands for Artificial Intelligence - was recently launched at the research and transfer center. The TU Ilmenau and the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, together with the Ilmenau Institute for Microelectronic and Mechatronic Systems (IMMS) and Thuringian companies, are working on twelve individual projects in three promising areas: In the area of healthcare and medical technology, scientists are researching intelligent medical technology; in production and quality assurance, innovative methods for automated production monitoring are being tested; and in the area of smart city, scientists from TU Ilmenau and IMMS are working with the city of Ilmenau to develop intelligent digital solutions for the efficiency, citizen-friendliness and sustainability of modern communities. thurAI is being funded by the Free State of Thuringia with over three million euros for three years. Through the "Package of Measures for Innovation Potentials", the state is funding forward-looking research and development projects in Thuringian research institutions and companies.

Commissioning of GPU Cluster at the Computing Center of TU Ilmenau
ServerraumiStock

In order to be able to carry out the highly ambitious projects in the future field of artificial intelligence, a so-called GPU cluster, funded by the Thüringer Aufbaubank, will soon go into operation at the computing center of the TU Ilmenau. If several GPUs, powerful graphics processors that are particularly well suited for high-performance computing due to their architecture, are connected to form a cluster, their performance is additionally multiplied. The parallel processing of huge amounts of data enables the most demanding learning processes of modern AI techniques and the complex calculations for training AI algorithms are significantly accelerated.

The new GPU cluster will also benefit research projects at TU Ilmenau, which are already underway. The project "Engineering for Smart Manufacturing (E4SM)", funded by the Carl Zeiss Foundation, is researching novel assistance systems for smart industrial manufacturing based on machine learning. And in the cross-department project CO-HUMANICS, novel methods are being developed to enable older people to make contact with remote people in their home environment using technologies such as augmented reality.

Artificial intelligence in research and teaching

TU Ilmenau is not only striving to place greater emphasis on artificial intelligence and data science in research, the new disciplines are also increasingly finding their way into the university's teaching - supported by the Free State of Thuringia, which is funding three additional professorships in the field of digitalisation at TU Ilmenau. The promising fields of Data Science for Engineering, Medical Informatics and Digital Materials Science complement the existing disciplines of the Ilmenau faculties in a meaningful way.

In order to achieve its goals, TU Ilmenau wants to attract the best workers to Thuringia - and promote promising talent. As part of the major transfer project thurAI, ambitious young scientists will come together in Thuringia in the future in innovative formats such as summer schools to conduct research on specific AI topics. For example, the summer school "Digitalization Workshop" is planned for 2022 at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and the summer school "Machine Learning in Engineering" is planned for 2023 at Ilmenau University of Technology. And in hackathon events - a neologism made up of "hack" and "marathon" - the young scientists develop software and hardware together.

With its AI offensive in research and teaching, TU Ilmenau will be able to compete nationally and internationally in the fields of artificial intelligence and data science. The new GPU cluster enables the use of state-of-the-art deep learning methods and provides the university and its partners with access to high-performance software.and its partners access to the most powerful data processing.In this way, the university, the city and the state are continuing to move together towards the future.

 
Contact

Prof. Kai-Uwe Sattler
President

3677 69-5001
praesident@tu-ilmenau.de