Expertise

KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm is Sweden’s largest technical research and learning institution and home to students, researchers and faculty from around the world dedicated to advancing knowledge. The wide spectrum of research at KTH demands variation in focus, approach and formation. We work to create an open atmosphere and break down traditional barriers between academic disciplines. Basic research is conducted in parallel with applied research, and the same is true of multidisciplinary work and specifically targeted work. Based on strong areas of research at KTH, five focus areas have been created. These work as platforms for multidiciplinary research.

- Transport - Life Science - Materials - Information and Communication Technology - Energy

The KTH Transport Platform is one the focal points in the collaborations with KTH’s Strategic Partners with activities related to the transport field. KTH has formed Strategic partnerships with 11 companies, out of these 9 have a link to the Transport research area: Scania, Bombardier, Skanska, SAAB, ABB, Ericsson, Vattenfall, Stockholm Municipality and Stockholm Regional authority.

Scope of the KTH Transport Platform

With the ongoing globalisation, a growing world population and an increasing urbanization, the transport of people and goods sees a tremendous growth worldwide. The challenges associated to the environment, natural resource utilization and space allocation are becoming more and more complex to solve. To reach this, we need to break with the disciplinary/thematic research paradigm and in joint collaborative efforts; involving industry, society and academia; formulate a new approach among others involving an increasing degree of multi-disciplinarity in research as well as education and training.

The overall objective of the KTH Transport platform is to contribute to the establishment of a multidisciplinary research culture which collects input in the form of societal needs and trends, and based on these formulates joint multidisciplinary research ideas and in an integrated approach define applications for funding for the planned research. The KTH Transport Platform is a vehicle for integration of transport related research from almost all of the Schools of KTH, in the form of individual researchers, multi-disciplinary oriented research centres as well as infrastructure in the form of laboratories etc.

According to the latest mapping, more than 850 researchers at KTH are actively involved in transport related research. They are members of more than 40 research groups and 18 centers of excellence. To achieve this vision the platforms mission is to:

- Provide meeting places in a multi-disciplinary research culture setting. - Encourage research activities, involving industry, government agencies and relevant academic institutions worldwide, in joint collaborative efforts. - Connect researchers in activities with the potential for leading to innovative solutions derived from a joint policy-systems-technology approach.

The corresponding integrating activities are managed through 5 thematic areas each contributing with a technology oriented vision:

- Holistic transport system - Innovative vehicle concepts - Policy and institutions - Transportation infrastructure - Transport in the Information Age

Participation in EU Projects and International Activities

KTH has a long history of participation to EU-funded research in general, some recent examples pertaining to road transport and automotive are given below.

- LOWBRASYS: a LOW environmental impact BRAke SYStem - ECCENTRIC: Innovative solutions for sustainable mobility of people in suburban city districts and emission free freight logistics in urban centres. - NOESIS: NOvel Decision Support tool for Evaluating Strategic Big Data investments in Transport and Intelligent Mobility Services. - METPEX: A Measurement Tool to determine the quality of the Passenger Experience. - COMPANION: Cooperative mobility solutions for supervised platooning. - ENSEMBLE (starting June 2018): Enabling safe multi-brand platooning for Europe. - WISE-ACT: Wider Impacts and Scenario Evaluation of Autonomous and Connected Transport. - LITEBUS: Modular Lightweight Sandwich bus concept. - EVERSAFE: Everyday Safety for Electric Vehicles. - TECABS: Technologies for carbon fibre reinforced modular automotive structures.