Challenges and State-of-Practice Survey of Artificial Intelligence in Railways

(Original webpage: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeUNBU3VUCBXzaM5O3sqM4kpMM8GgwPTs7wpU_zXkmecOTO3g/viewform)

This survey aims at obtaining a deeper understanding of the Challenges and State-of-Practice (SoP) of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in railway transportation from the perspective of diverse stakeholders. Results are collected in the context of the H2020 Shift2Rail project RAILS (Roadmaps for A.I. integration in the raiL Sector), to understand priorities and requirements when defining the roadmaps for AI integration in the rail sector.

The survey is distributed to Shift2Rail members, project partners and other project participants, as well as to other railway organizations and regulatory bodies. Aggregated and anonymous results will be disseminated primarily through the project website https://rails-project.eu/.

You are welcome to add customized answers by using the text box “Other”.

We would like to thank you in advance for the time you will invest in filling this survey!

IMPORTANT NOTE:
Please note that at the end of the questionnaire you can decide whether to share your personal data with the project team and if you are available to be contacted, otherwise you can remain fully anonymous.
Please note that even if you agree to be contacted, we will not share your name and affiliation with anyone except the project team. Only aggregated and anonymous results of the survey will be publicly disclosed.

If you encounter any problems, need clarifications, or want to report your feedback on the questionnaire, please contact:
Prof. Valeria Vittorini (project leader): valeria.vittorini@unina.it
Prof. Francesco Flammini (technical leader): francesco.flammini@lnu.se

THE SURVEY WILL CLOSE ON 31st MAY 2021!

First Advisory Board Meeting

We successfully ran the first Advisory Board Meeting on 1st March 2021 online. We would like to thank all AB members who participated in this meeting and for their valuable contributions! We saw many interesting presentations there and would like to keep this momentum in the future.

AB memebers to joined the meeting:

  • Aitex (IT)
  • Comesvil (IT)
  • European Union Agency for Railways – ERA (EU)
  • Hitachi Rail STS (IT)
  • Netherlands Railways (NL)
  • NextTechnologies Ltd. (HU)
  • ProRAIL (NL)
  • SYENMAINT (IT)

Second AI4RAILS Workshop

The 2nd International Workshop on “Artificial Intelligence for RAILwayS”(AI4RAILS)

co-located with EURO 2021

11-14 July, 2021

Athens, Greece

The impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques on industry has been so disruptive that it gave rise to a new wave of research and applications. Several industries, mainly in logistics and manufacturing, have benefited significantly from AI adoption and this positive trend is planned to be kept in the future. Modern and future railways represent one of the fields in which AI is expected to have a significant impact in a medium to long term perspective, in order to get higher levels of automation of railway processes. On the one hand, this opens for unprecedented scenarios for railway systems, and on the other hand, it also raises concerns regarding system dependability and new threats associated with a high level of autonomy.

Therefore, the first step towards the adoption of AI in the railway sector is understanding to what extent AI can be considered effective, reliable, safe and secure. In such a context, building upon the ongoing Shift2Rail project RAILS (Roadmaps for the AI integration in the raiL Sector), the aim of AI4RAILS is to provide a forum for researchers and practitioners to discuss and share new perspectives, ideas, technologies and solutions for an effective and dependable integration of AI techniques in rail-based transport systems.

More details can be found at: https://rails-project.eu/ai4rails/

AI4RAILS 2020 goes online

AI4RAILS – Call for Papers

1st International Workshop on Artificial Intelligence for RAILwayS
co-located with the 16th European Dependable Computing Conference (EDCC2020)
September 7, 2020

AI4RAILS 2020 has moved to digital mode due to pandemic COVID-19.

IMPORTANT NOTICE: Since the workshop will not be held in-site there
will be no registration fees!

Website: https://sites.google.com/view/ai4rails

The International Workshop on ?Artificial Intelligence for RAILwayS?
(AI4RAILS) is the first workshop specifically addressing topics
related to the adoption of Artificial Intelligence technologies in
railway applications. Supported by the Shift2Rail project RAILS,
AI4RAILS 2020 is the first of a series of workshops intended as a
reference forum for international researchers and industry
practitioners providing their novel ideas, results and experiences on
smart-railways in the general context of intelligent transportation
systems.

The aim of the 1st AI4RAILS workshop is to provide a forum for
researchers, practitioners and business leaders to discuss and share
new perspectives, ideas, technologies and solutions for effective and
dependable integration of AI techniques in rail-based transportation
systems.

More information, submission guidelines and contacts are available at
the workshop website.

***Topics***
AI4RAILS invites researchers, practitioners and business leaders to
present and discuss their latest research results on theory,
approaches and tools for design, development, operation and
maintenance of smart-railways by means of AI techniques.
Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
– AI for railway safety, availability, reliability and security
– Transferability to railways of AI approaches from other sectors
(e.g., avionics, automotive, etc.)
– Autonomous and cooperative train driving, including virtual coupling
– Automatic detection of railway signals and obstacles
– Railway predictive maintenance and defect detection
– AI for rail traffic planning and management
– Adversarial perturbations to AI with a focus on railway case-studies
– Resource allocation with a focus on railway case-studies
– Run-time model checking and AI with a focus on railway case-studies
– Explainable and trustworthy AI in railway applications
– Safe autonomy standards and railway certification of compliance
– Railway datasets and real-world case studies

***Submission and Publication***
AI4RAILS 2020 invites original paper not submitted elsewhere,
presenting original contribution. Papers must be in English, up to 12
pages in Springer format, including references and appendices. Paper
submission instructions and publication details are available on the
workshop website.

The AI4RAILS proceedings will be published to Springer Communications
in Computer and Information Science (CCIS).
Distinguished papers will be invited to submit an extended version in
a dedicated Special Issue on high ranked journals.

***Important Dates***
Regular paper submission:  June 1, 2020
Authors notification: June 29, 2020
Camera-ready paper due: July 10, 2020

***Workshop Chairs***
Valeria Vittorini, University of Naples Federico II, Italy
Francesco Flammini, Mälardalen University & Linnaeus University, Sweden
Roberto Nardone, University Mediterranea of Reggio Calabria, Italy
Stefano Marrone, University of Naples Federico II, Italy

We organize a session at the 2020 INFORMS Annual Meeting

We organize a session Machine Learning in railroad transportation at the 2020 INFORMS Annual Meeting in Washington, USA (http://meetings2.informs.org/wordpress/nationalharbor2020/). Some of the topics interesting for the session are scheduling, traffic and mobility predictions, maintenance. If you wish to present your research, please contact Nikola Besinovic (n.besinovic@tudelft.nl).

The submission includes a short abstract (100 words). The deadline for submitting abstracts is 1 June.

In addition, the complete overview of railway sessions is here: https://connect.informs.org/railway-applications/new-item2/new-item

Media: Article about RAILS published on ERCIM News

We have an article about the RAILS project published on ERCIM News, the magazine of ERCIM (The European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics) that reports on joint actions of the ERCIM partners, and aims to reflect the contribution made by ERCIM to the European Community in Information Technology.

You can find the full article (“Roadmaps for AI Integration in the Rail Sector – RAILS”) here:

https://ercim-news.ercim.eu/en121/r-i/roadmaps-for-ai-integration-in-the-rail-sector-rails