Centers of excellence

The Center of Excellence in Sustainable Green Hydrogen and Energy Technologies, led by Professor of Physical Chemistry Enn Lust, focuses on developing novel energy conversion and storage devices. A demo centre will be set up to showcase advanced hydrogen and energy generation and storage devices, demonstrate them in operation, and cooperate with companies to find ways to produce new devices and bring technologies to market. Tallinn University of Technology has been involved in the work of the centre of excellence as a partner.

The Estonian Centre of Excellence in Artificial Intelligence, led by Associate Professor in Machine Learning Meelis Kull, advances innovative methodologies that help develop reliable AI systems. These methodologies are applied to increase AI capabilities in key Estonian sectors, including e-governance, healthcare, business process management, and cybersecurity. Tallinn University of Technology and Cybernetica AS are partners in the centre of excellence.

The Centre of Excellence for Personalised Medicine, led by Professor of Bioinformatics Reedik Mägi, focuses on preventing and alleviating health problems in an ageing population. This will be done by developing risk models for predicting diseases, taking into account the individual’s origin, living and cultural environment, and by looking for biomarkers associated with diseases. Special attention is given to issues of population involvement because when implementing personalised medicine, it is essential for people to understand their central role and responsibility in keeping healthy. For example, the researchers will look into what people expect from the medical system and what steps they are willing to take to maintain their health. Tallinn University, OÜ ProtoBioS, and the Competence Centre on Health Technologies are involved in the centre of excellence as partners.

In Estonian Roots: Centre of Excellence for transdisciplinary studies on ethnogenesis and cultural diversity, led by Professor of Archaeogenomics Kristiina Tambets, researchers of the humanities and scientists cooperate to clarify the formation of cultural and genetic diversity in Estonia and neighbouring areas. Based on precise data from archaeogenetics, studies of culture and linguistics, and paleoecology, the centre of excellence will generate new knowledge on the evolution of the population and the unique culture of these areas in the European context. Tallinn University of Technology and the Estonian Literary Museum participate in the project as partners.

The Estonian Center of Excellence of Well-being Sciences, led by Professor of Affective Psychology Andero Uusberg, will bring together social and natural scientists who study people and the contexts in which they operate to find new methods to measure, understand and influence human well-being. Improving well-being is both an end in itself and a means to support economic growth, democracy, societal resilience and other values of society. Tallinn University of Technology and Tallinn University are involved in the centre of excellence as partners.

The Centre of Excellence in Energy Efficiency, led by Professor Jarek Kurnitski, is going to help break the trend of growing energy consumption and support a breakthrough in the complete renovation of residential buildings. For this purpose, Estonia’s best competence in engineering, data, and social sciences is brought together.

The Centre of Excellence for the Circular Economy of Strategic Mineral and Carbon-based Resources, led by Professor Riina Aav, is going to jointly find solutions for managing complex supply chains and ensuring the quality of recyclable materials. The aim is to overcome the technological problems associated with mineral and carbon-based commodities.

The Center of Excellence of Agroecology and New Crops in Future Climate, led by Ülo Niinemets, Professor of Crop Science and Plant Biology, is going to develop agro-ecological sustainable farming methods to reduce the global footprint of food production in a changing climate.

The Centre of Excellence of Fundamental Universe is led by Research Professor Martti Raidal.

The Centre of Excellence of Sustainable Land Use is led by Evelyn Uuemaa, Professor of Geoinformatics, focuses on novel land use planning to preserve biodiversity and ensure carbon balance. Field data, satellite data and machine learning are used for identifying and modelling the relationships between the carbon cycle and biodiversity. Socioeconomic analysis is used to assess the attitudes of landowners and land users and the feasibility of the new land-use approaches. Other members of the centre of excellence are the Estonian University of Life Sciences and the Centre of Estonian Rural Research and Knowledge.