This thematic area aims at linking engineering sciences and environmental sciences with urbanization, mobility, and transport. The area regards phenomena related to natural ecosystems and the built environment in a space-time perspective that is well suited to guarantee a sustainable development of land use, transport systems, and mobility. This area aims at proposing solutions for a sustainable growth of the territories and a smart and sustainable use of the resources using engineering sciences and the emerging technologies and techniques related to data science, automation, artificial intelligence.
Both innovation and a robust methodological foundation, with an interdisciplinary approach, are used to support the design of infrastructures, planning of a smarter and more sustainable mobility, and a territorial planning using the available geo-environmental resources. Geo-localized data, geo-databases, big data on territory and mobility are of fundamental importance to describe the spatial distribution of information and the critical environmental issues and constraints, both at the site (building), at network (infrastructures) and at the global scale (urban/territorial contexts).
The improvement of urban environments is not limited to spatial features, performances, and layouts; it increasingly concerns design, conceptualization, energy redevelopment and knowledge of the territory in its integrity, from its structure to hidden utility networks, infrastructures, and sub- and on-surface characterization.
The evaluation of the environmental impact of current and future technologies and infrastructures includes their optimal management, life cycle assessment, economic evaluation, and risk analysis. The area is characterized by empirical research, mainly performed with the support of quantitative methods, experimental campaigns, technological systems, data mining, ICT and modelling.
- PE10_5 Geology, tectonics, volcanology
- PE10_13 Physical geography, geomorphology
- PE10_14 Earth observations from space/remote sensing
- PE10_17 Hydrology, hydrogeology, engineering and environmental geology, water and soil pollution
- PE10_20 Geohazards: earthquakes, landslides, tsunamis and other ground instabilities
- PE6_11 Machine learning, statistical data processing and applications using signal processing (e.g. speech, image, video)
- PE6_12 Scientific computing, simulation and modelling tools
- SH2_6 Sustainability sciences, environment and resources
- SH2_7 Environmental and climate change, societal impact and policy
- SH2_8 Energy, transportation and mobility
- SH2_12 GIS, spatial analysis; big data in political, geographical and legal studies