On the occasion of the World Health Assembly in Geneva, ESA organised together with the Geneva digital health hub (gdhub), and various partners (UN agencies OOSA and WHO; Space and Global Health Network; Group on Earth Observations; Open Geneva; Space Generation Advisory Council; University of Geneva), a side event which focuses on Space and Global Health.
The program encompasses:
- 30 May 2024 the Geneva Digital Health Day conference
- 31 May – 1 June the Space and Global Health Hackathon
Following the call for challenges to broaden the spectrum of solutions that space can bring to the health sector, several ideas have been selected for the hackathon taking place in Geneva next 31 May – 1 June 2024, and the majority of them envisage the use of EO satellite data in combination with in-situ data and AI, with the involvement of local users and some key stakeholders in the health domain.
- #1 – Earthquake prediction with GNSS data
- #2 – To Be Cured (TBC centered project)
- #3 – EO-ISLAIS: Smart Health Response With Social Listening and Earth Observation Data
- #4 – AI-Enhanced, Personalized Stress Reduction for Astronaut Well-Being
- #5 – Forest Fires and Health
- #6 – Harnessing Collective Intelligence for Rapid Geolocation in Humanitarian health crises
- #7 – OPEN SKIN-AI : an open-access dataset of images for AI dermatology
- #8 – Tree Failure Radar
- #9 – Regional Diseases Surveillance Platform
- #10 – Global Heat Resilience Service: decision-support platform
- #11 – Monitoring the Health of Trees from Ground to Space
- #12 – AI solutions to mitigate the lack of healthcare professionals in underserved regions
- #13 – Biorisks – marine litter and bacterial contamination
Is any of these challenges triggering your enthusiasm?
Then please Consider joining a team to be part of the upcoming event, either
- in person at the technologically-advanced premises of the Campus Biotech, where gdhub is hosted, which is only five minutes’ walk from the shores of Lake Leman
- online working directly with your preferred challenge team leader
Who can participate?
Anyone can apply to participate in the event, and we encourage interdisciplinary backgrounds from any country on Earth!
Applicants can apply as an individual or in a team, with or without experience in this type of event. It is mandatory to work as a team during the hackathon and it is advisable to form/join a team with complementary talents to enrich the solutions offered.
How to join
Use the Sparkboard to register, following the instructions provided in How to join a challenge?
If you have any questions, you will probably find the answer in the FAQ.
Keep an eye on the timeline not to miss any step and deadline!
Support during the hackathon
Mentoring, data, and computing resources may be provided by ESA during the hackathon upon request.
For the EO specific challenges, access to Third Party Mission (TPM) data, Network of Resources (NoR) and DeepESDL can be granted.
In addition, there will be also the possibility to access crowdsourced super computing power (more info)
Final prizes
🥇 First Prize: CHF 2000
🥈 Second Prize: CHF 1000
🏅 Public Choice Award: CHF 500
In addition to the announced prizes
two special awards are foreseen, including two IDEA ACCELERATION PACKAGES and a trip to participate to the EO4Health user Forum 2025!
The packages are worth for the first special award the equivalent of 35K euro and for the second award the equivalent of 15K euro, and they are co-sponsored by ESA and European EO companies (GMV; Brockmann Consulting; GMATICS; IZSAM; PML).
These two idea acceleration packages will allow ideas to flourish over a period of 9 months, with specialised mentoring, access to cloud computing, commercial EO data and business planning support, short internships, international networking: all in an open innovation environment.
The hackathon context
This hackathon is part of a series of activities, projects and user forums dedicated to untapping the potential of space technology in global health.
In particular, it follows the discussion and conclusions of the ESA EO4Health User Forum 2024, which took place last 15-16 January.