Demand for highly trained scientists with a deep understanding of algebraic and geometric methods combined with computer algebra techniques for global non-linear optimization problems, over discrete or continuous domains is particularly high in control engineering, physics, information processing, economy, biology. The need of global solutions to (non-linear) optimisation problems is indeed likewise high in many applications such as smarter cities challenges, urban traffic management, water network management, energy flow control, as well as in environmental monitoring. Hence, skills on the design of efficient algorithms and software handling nonlinearity and providing global solutions are essential to the industrial fields of civil engineering and energy and more generally for engineering issues at the cut edge of technology. Training scientists at the interplay of algebra, geometry and computer science for polynomial optimization problems is therefore of first importance to obtain significant achievements in these fields. POEMA contributes to satisfy this demand by fostering scientific and technological advances in the area of polynomial optimization, stimulating interdisciplinary and intersectoriality knowledge exchange between algebraists, geometers, computer scientists and industrial actors facing real-life optimization problems, in a network of PhD students at its core. A unique strength of POEMA is to gather top-researchers on the most fundamental algebraic aspects of polynomial optimization, methods from convex geometry, numerical analysis and computer algebra as well as modelling real-life applications of polynomial optimization. POEMA will train young scientists in academy or industry in how to exploit the best of these techniques efficiently and disseminate this knowledge to industry. As a truly multidisciplinary network, POEMA will at the same time seek to apply these new techniques to real-life applications thanks to the industrial actors involved in the network.
The overall training goal of the network POEMA is to provide a group of young scientists with an inherent interdisciplinary training in polynomial optimization and with inter-sectorial experience. More precisely, the objectives are:
- To define a curriculum for research-led training at the PhD level that offers a variety of technical and complementary approaches including computer algebra, real algebraic geometry, and numerical analysis.
- To provide the ESR fellows with the opportunity for career developments and to expose him/her with multisectorial domains. To educate a group of top-level scientists experts, who will form the basis for a network of people in Polynomial Optimization.
- To develop the cooperation between academia and industrial partners as well as between all partners, from which the ESR fellows will benefit.
The general objective of POEMA will be achieved by building up a training program with experts from different scientific domains and organisations: research laboratories, universities, and industrial partners. The host institutions, targeted student secondments and schools organized in the network can offer additional training. The cooperation between the research centres, the universities and industrial partners offers a unique opportunity for the POEMA fellows career development, but should also provide concrete structural collaboration between the partners beyond the duration of the project. It will bring the foundation stones of a European school for training in polynomial optimization and their applications.