Collaborative Research: IRES Track II: Short Courses on Manufacturing Frontiers Leveraging Unique Facilities in Italy

The Advanced Studies Institute (ASI) will take place in northern Italy, including the cities of Milan, Turin, Bologna, and Modena, where a strong and resilient manufacturing sector resides. As evidenced in recent years, a resilient manufacturing sector is critical for coping with an international supply chain disruption. In addition, a strong manufacturing sector is essential to economic prosperity and national security as it generates employment and wealth while encouraging research and technological innovation.

The ASI will help prepare an advanced manufacturing workforce for the United States to succeed in an increasingly competitive global market. The ASI will promote collaborative and global thinking and prepare the participating students to become more comfortable with international collaborations. The ASI will also expose participating students to emerging manufacturing technologies, as well as strong bridges between fundamental research and industrial applications.

Novel technologies and manufacturing processes or systems resulting from the workforce development and international collaborative research will lead to long-term economic benefits for both the U.S. and Italy. The ASI will help train the next generation of American manufacturing leaders who can leverage the global resources to contribute to a more resilient U.S. economy.

The Advanced Studies Institute (ASI) leverages the unique facilities in Italy to train U.S. manufacturing engineering students and foster innovative research ideas. Italy’s strong manufacturing sector embraces emerging technologies that are the building blocks of Industry 4.0, or the Fourth Industrial revolution. Industry 4.0 transforms a physical model of manufacturing to a digital one, creating “smart factories” and introducing digital business models.

The ASI is comprised of eight short courses with each course covering one emerging technology of Industry 4.0: (1) advanced processes and robotics, (2) horizontal and vertical integration, (3) Internet of Things, (4) simulation, (5) advanced machining, (6) augmented and virtual reality, (7) additive manufacturing, and (8) big data and cloud computing. Short courses are complemented by factory tours, research discussions, and short-term projects.

There will be 15 U.S. graduate students participating in the ASI each year, totaling 30 students for the two-year duration of the project. Each ASI student will be in Italy for 15 days. The key Italian partners are eight world-class researchers.

They will teach short courses, moderate discussion sessions, recruit and select the Italian students to join the U.S. students, as well as mentor all ASI students. Other Italian partners include three research labs that will host visits from the ASI students, the Italian Association of Manufacturing Technologies that will work with its member companies to arrange factory tours, and ten companies that will offer factory tours.

Overall, students will have access to a unique research environment in Italy where both universities and industries facilitate the maturity of research projects into commercialization.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.