Europe cannot afford merely to undergo the profound transformations that artificial intelligence is bringing to science, technology, society and culture. It must play an active role in shaping them. To do so, a European Centre for Artificial Intelligence Research is needed: a scientific initiative rooted in human capital and a long-term vision, built on solid theoretical foundations, equipped with ever-growing computing power and designed to interact dynamically with start-ups and industry.
The proposal emerged from a meeting of some of the world’s leading AI scholars and experts, held at the University of Bologna as part of an initiative promoted by Nobel laureate Giorgio Parisi and the University of Bologna's Professor Pierluigi Contucci. The discussions led to the drafting of a Manifesto setting out the principles on which a European Centre for Artificial Intelligence Research should be founded.
“It should be a cohesive institution, with a strong scientific core devoted both to fundamental theory and to the exploration of new directions in applied research, centred on human capital and interdisciplinary collaboration, and governed with transparency and independence,” explains Pierluigi Contucci. “ At the heart of its mission should be energy efficiency, open models and ethical reflection, alongside the promotion of global alliances deeply rooted in Europe’s scientific traditions.”
Alongside Contucci and Parisi, contributors to the Manifesto for the new European Centre include Yann LeCun, Turing Award laureate; Cédric Villani, Fields Medalist; British computer scientist and entrepreneur Michael Bronstein; Argentine-American physicist and neuroscientist Sara Solla; Marc Mézard, now at Bocconi University and former Director of the École Normale Supérieure, and a pioneer of statistical-physics methods applied to AI; Nuria Oliver, Director of the Ellis Alicante Foundation; machine learning expert Bernhard Schölkopf; and Italian scholars Stefano Leonardi (Sapienza University of Rome), Paolo Branchini (INFN) and Giuseppe De Pietro (FAIR). Participants also included Andrea Ripa, Titular Bishop of Cerveteri, reflecting a dialogue that embraces the ethical and cultural dimensions of artificial intelligence as well.
The vision that emerged from the event is that of a research centre with a lean, high-impact organisation. This shared endeavour among scholars from different disciplines could give rise to new tools to enhance Europe’s areas of excellence: from multilingual language technologies to robotics, from healthcare and biomedical research to climate and environmental modelling, through to data security and digital sustainability.
The new European Centre would also be supported by a structure specifically designed to connect research, industry and society, enabling the management of collaborative projects, the rapid development of prototypes and shared models of intellectual property. Industrial partnerships would be encouraged, but always balanced against the public interest, to ensure resilient innovation ecosystems. In this way, the creation and growth of start-ups would be fostered, as well as the transfer of knowledge, code and data to researchers and businesses, while protecting emerging initiatives from premature acquisition.
“This is a decisive moment for Europe,” adds Professor Contucci. “Together, we can ensure that artificial intelligence develops as a tool for knowledge, cooperation and the public good. For this reason, we invite institutions, researchers and leaders from the public and private sectors to join forces, contributing ideas and resources to the creation of this Centre, which will be established as a place of research, collaboration and European scientific freedom.”
