The project name is inspired by the 19th century scientist, Charles Darwin, whose famous theory of evolution is based on the observation that species must ‘adapt to survive’. So, the DARWIN project’s main goal is to provide up-to-date and effective guidelines to facilitate faster, more effective and highly adaptive responses to crises, both natural (e.g. flooding, earthquakes) and man-made disasters (e.g. aircraft incidents), allowing resilience in different domains. These guidelines, which will evolve to accommodate the changing nature of crises, are developed for those with responsibility of protecting the population or critical infrastructure/services from policy to practice: critical infrastructure managers, crisis and emergency response managers, service providers, first responders and policy makers. To ensure the guidelines are dynamic, effective and user-friendly, the project will adopt innovative tools, including serious gaming and training packages. The guidelines will also be tested in strategic pilot studies in two key sectors Healthcare and Air Traffic Management. In order to foster communications among the European crisis and resilience community, DARWIN establishes a Community of Practitioners (DCoP), bringing the relevant stakeholders across Europe. This forum, that will exist beyond the lifetime of the project, lets them to exchange views and innovations around their responses to crisis.