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About MARC

The research profile Mälardalen University Automation Research Center (MARC) is dedicated to advancing digitalisation and automation in industry through a comprehensive approach involving multiple research areas and industrial partnerships. The expected scientific achievements include the development of innovative solutions in portable and smart automation, robotics and control, as well as digital infrastructure. These advancements will enable significantly enhanced production flexibility, responsiveness, and sustainability, aligning with the vision of creating a leading research and education environment.

MARC Overall Objective

To enhance the level of digitalisation and automation in industry by addressing three major challenges: (1) improving the flexibility of automation systems and solutions, (2) advancing the application and automation of robotics and control, and (3) strengthening digital infrastructures. We will bring together academic and industrial experts, providing a unique opportunity for tangible impacts on academic and industrial practices

Co-production

Collaboration with industrial partners is a central element of the research plan, bringing together expertise from academia and industry. This partnership aims to tackle real-world challenges, to facilitate knowledge transfer, and to foster innovation as well as technology and competence transfer in both directions. The collaboration is expected to yield practical solutions applicable in various industrial contexts, thereby enhancing the competitiveness of Swedish and European industry.

Research Areas

In MARC the research at Mälardalen University (MDU) will capitalise on synergies primarily between the two research environments Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and Innovation and Product Realisation (IPR), and provide a solid base for junior researchers to grow into future research leaders. Combined with industrial partnerships, this aligns with the mission to combine research excellence with industrial relevance, emphasising co-production with external partners.

Research Area 1:Portable and smart automation

 

This RA lies at the forefront of advancing the area of responsive and circular production systems through the realisation of "portable and smart automation" with cutting-edge re­ search and development.

«Research Directions»

Portable automation solutions

Digital technologies for smart automation

Increased availability of automation through servitisation of manufacturing assets

Research Area 2: Robotics and control

 

«Research Directions»

This research area in multi-robot systems aims to develop sophisticated, efficient, and secure control and robotics systems capable of collaborative operation. This involves creating cutting-edge algorithms for automated planning and distributed control, enabling multiple robotic entities to perform complex tasks in unison with enhanced efficiency and adaptability.

Automated planning of multi-robot systems

Distributed control and coordination of multi-robot systems

Cybersecurity in control systems

Research Area 3: Computing continuum and digital infrastructure

 

This research area aims to facilitate seamless core-to-edge computing, handling computationally heavy workloads using combined cloud, edge, and local computing resources. Targeting algorithms with high computation demands and large datasets, we intend to provide a framework for developing optimised parallel software, adaptive allocation to heterogeneous hardware platforms, and automatic hardware acceleration.

«Research Directions»

Software development

Design, analysis, and estimation

Robust middlewares