The ESA Φ-lab Newsletter #13 | June 2024

REVOLUTIONISING EARTH OBSERVATION: HOW INNOVATIVE RESEARCH IN AI IS TRANSFORMING OUR PLANETARY INSIGHTS

Dear Φ-lab community,

Striving for a revolution in the Earth observation (EO) field, Φ-lab is leading activities to develop ChatGPT-like tools with foundation models, in order to get new insights about our planet. Since the volume of satellite data available highly surpasses human processing capabilities, projects like PhilEO, FAST-EO and FM4CS show the ability for rapid, self-supervised learning, together with adaptation to a broad range of tasks. Alongside foundation models, Φ-lab is also participating in the creation of an EO virtual expert with its partner, Pi School, via large language models. The target point for both foundation models and large language models is an EO digital assistant that can respond to information and knowledge queries in natural language, producing reliable and validated content.

This issue of our newsletter follows the success of We Make Future 2024 - from 13 to 15 June - a global network that connects education, empowerment and innovation. This three-day initiative included more than 100 events, combining research, B2B meetings, networking, culture, concerts, and entertainment within the BolognaFiere venue. Giuseppe Borghi, Head of ESA Φ-lab Division, gave a mainstage talk on an “AI Symphony for the Climate Challenge”, demonstrating our commitment to shaping the future and emphasizing the intersection of space, AI, and innovation.

Head of the Φ-lab Explore Office Rafael Kargren, Φ-lab members Sabrina Ricci, Carlos Urbina Ortega, Alessandro Sebastianelli, and ESA's Air Quality Platform engineer Massimiliano Ferrante were present at the ESA Innovative Booth, which served as a hub for the engagement of various stakeholders. Visitors were captivated by Φ-lab’s cutting-edge projects, fostering conversations about space exploration, AI applications and technological advancements.

A key point at the 2024 We Make Future event was the Quantum Computing for Earth Observation (QC4EO) Call, announced during the Quantum and Earth Observation round table, in partnership with CINECA. This call drove an overwhelming response from innovators, reinforcing our belief in the power of collective intelligence.

CALL FOR QC4EO

Now, it is time to do a recap of what we accomplished during the last three months.

Stay tuned for more news on EO groundbreaking research and applications.

The Φ-lab team

LATEST FROM THE LAB

FDL EUROPE 2024

17-21 June – ESA Φ-lab, in collaboration with Frontier Development Lab (FDL) Europe, launched an annual, intense eight-week challenge, focusing on ESA missions with participants from various Member States. During its last week at ESRIN, FDL Europe 2024 highlighted four critical research sprints, with a special focus on ESA missions, including EU Copernicus Sentinel, VIGIL, and the newly launched or upcoming Earth Explorer missions, such as EarthCARE and Biomass.

30-31 May – Organised by International Telecommunication Union, in partnership with 40 UN sister agencies, and held in Geneva, Switzerland, the AI4Good Global Summit focused on exploring state-of-the-art AI solutions and cutting-edge knowledge, aligning with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and responsible AI use. Sabrina Ricci, AI Ecosystem Manager at Φ-lab, was present at the “Navigating GeoAI: Plotting the course for future education” workshop, within the framework of ESA Φ-lab collaboration with Politecnico di Milano and Prof. Maria Antonia Brovelli.

29 May – Open Cosmos, a company supported by Φ-lab InCubed and a leading provider of space missions and data, was selected by ESA to deploy an Earth Observation Constellation, within the Greek National Programme, consisting of seven satellites which will supply daily high-resolution and very-high-resolution imagery.

7-10 May – With record attendance and a host of new topics covered, the 2024 joint workshop explored synergies between machine learning, deep learning and conventional tools as applied to satellite observations and weather and climate models.

14-19 April – Held in Vienna, Austria, the latest European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly hosted Φ-lab members Casper Fibaek and Nikolaos Dionelis, who gave a talk on “The PhilEO Geospatial Foundation Model Suite”.

8-12 April – This year’s hybrid edition took place in Rimini, Italy, and online. Focusing on chatbots and virtual assistants, sustainability, open innovation and metaverses, Giuseppe Borghi, Head of Φ-lab Division, gave a talk titled “An ‘AI Symphony’ for the planet: AI Solutions for Climate Change”. Φ-labber Sabrina Ricci was present at the ESA Networking Corner to enlarge collaborations and partnerships within the AI Italian and European ecosystem.

ESA Φ-lab synergises with SmartSat CRC for Earth observation advancements

ESA Φ-lab and SmartSat CRC promoted an exchange initiative for researchers and PhD students to develop new onboard processing and synthetic aperture radar (SAR)-related technologies, and flood forecasting datasets.

Following last year’s calls for proposals in the United Kingdom and Spain, seven new InCubed activities have now commenced. These activities demonstrate how customer-oriented Earth observation solutions provide technological advances and tangible societal benefits.

ESA Φ-lab is supporting a project on identifying methane pipeline leakage using satellite data, which follows a data-fusion approach, employing machine learning algorithms to combine various remote sensing image and other time-series data sources.

7-12 July – The upcoming IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS) will be hosted in Athens, Greece. Under the theme “Acting for Sustainability and Resilience”, Φ-lab members Casper Fibaek and Nikolaos Dionelis will present their latest publications about the PhilEO Bench, Ground-to-Aerial Image Matching and High Resolution Aerial Images. Φ-labbers Rochelle Schneider, Alessandro Sebastianelli, Alistair Francis, Roberto Del Prete and Nicolas Longépé will talk about global navigation satellite systems, SAR speckle filtering, Major TOM expandable datasets, quantum-kernel machines, and onboard processing of raw multispectral imagery by deep learning.

8-10 July – Following an online event on 13 June to present the InCubed funding programme to the Greek industry ecosystem, Greek space companies will have the opportunity to interact with ESA and the Hellenic Space Agency to develop innovative projects in EO. These trilateral meetings will take place in Athens, Greece.

ESSAI & ACAI 2024

15-26 July – The second European Summer School on Artificial Intelligence (ESSAI) and the 21st Advanced Course on Artificial Intelligence (ACAI) will be held in Athens, Greece. Nikolaos Dionelis, Φ-lab research fellow, will present an ACAI tutorial on “Artificial Intelligence for Earth Observation” and talk about Φ-lab’s current projects and future perspectives (CLAIRE R2 Network workshop, 14 July).

10-13 September – The focus of this third edition will be the application of Computer Vision methods to overcome challenges in Remote Sensing (RS), taking place at the University of Sannio, Italy. As an ESA-sponsored event, Alessandro Sebastianelli, ESA Φ-lab research fellow, will present Φ-lab activities in the field of Quantum Computing for Earth Observation.

16-20 September - Organized by Università degli Studi di Bari Aldo Moro (UniBA), Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca Metrologica (INRiM) and INFN Sezione di Bari, the second edition of the summer school will be hosted in Bari, Italy, in the framework of the project QUASIMODO: Quantum Sensing and Modeling for One Health. The Quantum 2024 Summer School is designed for master and PhD students, and young researchers, providing a comprehensive vision of quantum technologies both on theory and experiments. Φ-lab member Alessandro Sebastianelli will present Φ-lab’s Quantum Computing for Earth Observation activities.

18-19 September – ESA Industry Space Days will be hosted at ESTEC, in Noordwijk, The Netherlands. The Φ-lab Invest Office will present the InCubed co-funding programme, fostering new opportunities for InCubed-Industry partnerships.

14-18 October – Co-hosted by the Italian Space Agency and Leonardo, the 75th edition of the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) will take place in Milan, Italy. Φ-lab members will present the InCubed co-funding programme to various stakeholders.

27-28 November – Taking place at KAP Europa in Frankfurt, Germany, the second CommEO edition will focus on addressing climate challenges and opportunities with Earth observation for human and planet prosperity. Calls for the CommEO Award - aimed at providing visibility, networking, and matchmaking opportunities to European space start-ups in the field of EO - will open soon. Stay tuned and take a look at the previous edition below.