The Smart & Sustainable Cities research unit combines multidisciplinary research and knowledge dissemination activities. It contributes to the improvement of knowledge and the mediation of scientific culture in Hauts-de-France. It aims to be transversal in terms of both discipline and approach. It includes sociologists, geographers, computer scientists, ecologists, biologists and economists. Transversal subjects related to data collection and the use of databases, big data, in various fields related to entrepreneurship, mobility, health or biodiversity are an example of the crossing of disciplines. 

The unit puts into perspective the evolution of the processes of the various contemporary transitions. It is a space for reflection on the economic, ecological and societal issues of these transitions. Its work is carried out at different scales, from the building to the city, its neighborhoods and its territory.

Far from exhausting all the subjects, the research carried out within this framework proposes original elements of analysis on certain facets of the energy and digital transition thanks to the use of new technical-economic approaches and the exploitation of new data.