The agency that funds R&D of cutting-edge energy technologies has announced up to $20 million in funding to speed up the incorporation of machine learning and artificial intelligence into these innovations and product design processes.
The Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, has a program known as DIFFERENTIATE that pinpoints six general mathematical optimization problems common to design processes. It then conceptualizes machine learning tools that could help engineers solve these challenges in a way that drastically speeds up the pace of energy innovation, the Energy Department agency said in a release.
Proposals for these projects should spell out a challenge problem, a solution, a data acquisition plan, development risks and the expected path to market for the final tool or software developed.
Small businesses in particular will be allocated up to $5 million under ARPA-Eās Small Business Innovation Research program. The rest of the $15 million will be available to other applicants.