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In recent years, the number and heterogeneity of large scientific datasets have been growing steadily. Moreover, the analysis of these data collections is not a trivial task. There are many algorithms capable of analyzing large datasets, but parameters need to be set for each of them. Moreover, larger datasets also mean greater complexity. All this leads to the need to develop innovative, scalable, and parameter-free solutions. The goal of this research activity is to design and develop an automated data analysis engine that effectively and efficiently analyzes large collections of text data with minimal user intervention. Both parameter-free algorithms and self-assessment strategies have been proposed to suggest algorithms and specific parameter values for each step that characterizes the analysis pipeline. The proposed solutions have been tailored to text corpora characterized by variable term distributions and different document lengths. In particular, a new engine called ESCAPE (enhanced self-tuning characterization of document collections after parameter evaluation) has been designed and developed. ESCAPE integrates two different solutions for document clustering and topic modeling: the joint approach and the probabilistic approach. Both methods include ad hoc self-optimization strategies to configure the specific algorithm parameters. Moreover, novel visualization techniques and quality metrics have been integrated to analyze the performances of both approaches and to help domain experts interpret the discovered knowledge. Both approaches are able to correctly identify meaningful partitions of a given document corpus by grouping them according to topics.

In the last few years, manufacturing systems are getting gradually transformed into smart factories. In this context, an increasing number of information and communication technologies is incorporated towards facilitating management, production, and control processes. The introduction of advanced embedded systems with enhanced connectivity produces a vast amount of data, posing a challenge in terms of data analytics. However, the in-time collection and analysis of acquired data can create insight into the manufacturing process as well as its assets. One aspect of major importance for every production system is preserving its equipment in operational condition, and within those limits that could minimize unplanned breakdowns and production stoppages. This paper details the predictive analytics methodology integrated into the SERENA platform able to: (i) streamline the prognostics of the industrial components, (ii) characterize the health status of the monitored equipment, (iii) generate an early warning related to the condition of the equipment, and (iv) forecast the future evolution of the monitored equipment’s degradation. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methodology, different use cases are discussed with results obtained on real-data collected in real-time from the industrial environments.

A Predictive Maintenance strategy for a complex machine requires a sophisticated and non-trivial analytical stage to provide accurate and trusted predictions. It must be planned and carried out carefully to maximise the information extracted from available data. The SERENA project provided an excellent methodological framework and a solid technical and software foundation to deliver a robust and applicable Predictive Maintenance solution for the White Goods industry. The proposed data-driven methodology was applied on a real use case, that is, estimating the degradation trend of industrial foaming machines and predicting their remaining useful life. The models were built based on historical data and are applied in real-time adjourning their predictions every time new data are collected. The results are promising and highlight how the proposed methodology can be used to achieve a fairly accurate estimate of machinery degradation and plan maintenance interventions accordingly, with significant savings in terms of costs and time.

The ever increasing demand for shorter production times and reduced production costs require manufacturing firms to bring down their production costs while preserving a smooth and flexible production process. To this aim, manufacturers could exploit data-driven techniques to monitor and assess equipmen’s operational state and anticipate some future failure. Sensor data acquisition, analysis, and correlation can create the equipment’s digital footprint and create awareness on it through the entire life cycle allowing the shift from time-based preventive maintenance to predictive maintenance, reducing both maintenance and production costs. In this work, a novel data analytics workflow is proposed combining the evaluation of an asset’s degradation over time with a self-assessment loop. The proposed workflow can support real-time analytics at edge devices, thus, addressing the needs of modern cyber-physical production systems for decision-making support at the edge with short response times. A prototype implementation has been evaluated in use cases related to the steel industry.

In this paper, we present CAROL (unConventionAl suRvey methOdoLogy) to collect users’ opinions, to analyze them effectively, and to graphically provide interesting summaries in near-real-time. CAROL has been designed to collect citizens’ opinions, needs, and a perception that can be very useful to redesign cities and drive the innovation process. To this aim, particular importance is given to the architecture implemented to collect the data, which involves sending voice messages instead of text, allowing users greater freedom of expression. Moreover, to make the survey more friendly, an initial analysis is done in real-time thanks to an intuitive dashboard, which shows the first results in the form of graphs and charts, updated after each message. Finally, a more in-depth analysis can be carried out at the end of the survey, thanks to text-mining techniques adapted to the context. As use case, the proposed methodology has been tested in a public event organized by Politecnico di Torino and addressed to female students, with the aim to collect their ideas about new services/opportunities that can be offered to support women in STEM.

In the era of “connected vehicles,” i.e., vehicles that generate long data streams during their usage through the telematics on-board device, data-driven methodologies assume a crucial role in creating valuable insights to support the decision-making process effectively. Predictive analytics allows anticipation of vehicle issues and optimized maintenance, reducing the resulting costs. In this paper, we focus on analyzing data collected from heavy trucks during their use, a relevant task for companies due to the high commercial value of the monitored vehicle. The proposed methodology, named TETRAPAC, offers a generalizable approach to estimate vehicle health conditions based on monitored features enriched by innovative key performance indicators. We discussed performance of TETRAPAC in two real-life settings related to trucks. The obtained results in both tasks are promising and able to support the company’s decision-making process in the planning of maintenance interventions.

The energy performance certificate (EPC) is a document that certifies the average annual energy consumption of a building in standard conditions and allows it to be classified within a so-called energy class. In a period such as this, when greenhouse gas emissions are of considerable importance and where the objective is to improve energy security and reduce energy costs in our cities, energy certification has a key role to play. The proposed work aims to model and characterize residential buildings&rsquo, energy efficiency by exploring heterogeneous, geo-referenced data with different spatial and temporal granularity. The paper presents TUCANA (TUrin Certificates ANAlysis), an innovative data mining engine able to cover the whole analytics workflow for the analysis of the energy performance certificates, including cluster analysis and a model generalization step based on a novel spatial constrained K-NN, able to automatically characterize a broad set of buildings distributed across a major city and predict different energy-related features for new unseen buildings. The energy certificates analyzed in this work have been issued by the Piedmont Region (a northwest region of Italy) through open data. The results obtained on a large dataset are displayed in novel, dynamic, and interactive geospatial maps that can be consulted on a web application integrated into the system. The visualization tool provides transparent and human-readable knowledge to various stakeholders, thus supporting the decision-making process.