The work groups of the Scientific and Technological Orientation Council

The work groups deal with scientific and technological question and give advice on such topics to the COST.

Animation and Prospective Work Group

Scientific animation and prospective are the two primary missions of the COST.  This group is intended to create more interactions between projects-teams of a same theme as well as on topics that are orthogonal to INRIA's division into themes. The group is in charge of scientific follow-up of the objectives of the current Strategic Plan and of the preparation of the next Strategic Plan. The group organizes and hosts prospective meetings on transversal scientific topics in order to foster new cooperations, or even to make new research themes emerge. The significance of the definition and composition of the Institute's research themes is continuously watched by the group. The group writes up prospective documents on scientific topics and establishes the state of the art in fields with an industrial impact for the COST.

International Relations Work Group

International relations are on the whole organized and supported by the Department fof European and International Affairs (DREI). The decisions of the DREI must be based on independent advice on the scientific content and relative merits of the activities. This groups monitors all of the Institute's international activities, including Associated teams and joint departments, and provides advice on their scientific contributions.

Incentive Initiatives Work Group

This work group organizes the selection, follow-up and scientific evaluation of INRIA's incentive initiatives, such as the Cooperative Research Initiatives (ARC) of the Scientific Management,  or the Software Development Operations and Standardization operations of the Department of Development and Industrial Relations. The group advises the COST on the opportune character, scientific content and format of the initiatives to be implemented in order to foster the emergence of R&D national initiatives, large scale initiatives and partnerships with other research organizations (CNRS, Cemagref, CEA, …).

Large Scale Initiatives Work Group

Large scale initiatives are initiatives that involve several research centres, and more generally teams that work in the context of different themes, and that can also involve external partners. This group examines proposals, proposes international evaluators and finds an agreement with the Evaluation Commission concerning the appropriate evaluation procedure. It advises the COST on the creation of new projects-teams.