Project SMART wins first edition of the AI Moonshot Challenge

The first edition of the AI Moonshot Challenge distinguished as the winner of Call the SMART project, which was awarded 500,000 euros to develop a solution that uses satellite data and artificial intelligence to combat pollution in the oceans. The winner was announced this Thursday, December 3, during Web Summit 2020.

The SMART project was the proposal presented by the consortium led by CERENA-IST, which includes the Laboratory of Underwater Systems and Technology (FEUP), Associate Laboratory Center for Environment and Sea Studies (CESAM), Hydrographic Institute and MIT-Portugal, and proposes the application of several advanced concepts of Artificial Intelligence, with particular focus on "Physics Informed GANs and Deep Neural Networks", and combine them with satellite images to develop a solution to mitigate the problem of plastic in the ocean.

Using satellite data from the Copernicus programme, the SMART team aims to determine the appropriate frequencies for detecting plastics in water bodies. This information will be complemented with advanced models that simulate ocean behavior to increase the likelihood of detecting plastics, a task made difficult by the size of the debris and the resolution of the satellite images currently available.

The AI Moonshot Challenge, promoted by the Portuguese Space Agency in cooperation with the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), Unbabel, European Space Agency (ESA), National Innovation Agency (ANI) and Web Summit, is a Call with an international aspect that aims to find disruptive ideas that combine satellite data and Artificial Intelligence for the detection of plastics in the oceans. The Call will have a new edition in 2021, whose rules of participation will be announced soon.