Intelligent multimedia communication for enhanced medical e-collaboration in back pain treatment

This is the post-print version of the Article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2004 SAGE PublicationsRemote, multimedia-based, collaboration in back pain treatment is an option which only recently has come to the attention of clinicians and IT providers. The take-up of such applications will inevitably depend on their ability to produce an acceptable level of service over congested and unreliable public networks. However, although the problem of multimedia application-level performance is closely linked to both the user perspective of the experience as well as to the service provided by the underlying network, it is rarely studied from an integrated viewpoint. To alleviate this problem, we propose an intelligent mechanism that integrates user-related requirements with the more technical characterization of quality of service, obtaining a priority order of low-level quality of service parameters, which would ensure that user-centred quality of perception is maintained at an optimum level. We show how our framework is capable of suggesting appropriately tailored transmission protocols, by incorporating user requirements in the remote delivery of e-health solutions

MusA: Using Indoor Positioning and Navigation to Enhance Cultural Experiences in a museum

In recent years there has been a growing interest into the use of multimedia mobile guides in museum environments. Mobile devices have the capabilities to detect the user context and to provide pieces of information suitable to help visitors discovering and following the logical and emotional connections that develop during the visit. In this scenario, location based services (LBS) currently represent an asset, and the choice of the technology to determine users' position, combined with the definition of methods that can effectively convey information, become key issues in the design process. In this work, we present MusA (Museum Assistant), a general framework for the development of multimedia interactive guides for mobile devices. Its main feature is a vision-based indoor positioning system that allows the provision of several LBS, from way-finding to the contextualized communication of cultural contents, aimed at providing a meaningful exploration of exhibits according to visitors' personal interest and curiosity. Starting from the thorough description of the system architecture, the article presents the implementation of two mobile guides, developed to respectively address adults and children, and discusses the evaluation of the user experience and the visitors' appreciation of these application

Authentication of Students and Students’ Work in E-Learning : Report for the Development Bid of Academic Year 2010/11

Global e-learning market is projected to reach $107.3 billion by 2015 according to a new report by The Global Industry Analyst (Analyst 2010). The popularity and growth of the online programmes within the School of Computer Science obviously is in line with this projection. However, also on the rise are students’ dishonesty and cheating in the open and virtual environment of e-learning courses (Shepherd 2008). Institutions offering e-learning programmes are facing the challenges of deterring and detecting these misbehaviours by introducing security mechanisms to the current e-learning platforms. In particular, authenticating that a registered student indeed takes an online assessment, e.g., an exam or a coursework, is essential for the institutions to give the credit to the correct candidate. Authenticating a student is to ensure that a student is indeed who he says he is. Authenticating a student’s work goes one step further to ensure that an authenticated student indeed does the submitted work himself. This report is to investigate and compare current possible techniques and solutions for authenticating distance learning student and/or their work remotely for the elearning programmes. The report also aims to recommend some solutions that fit with UH StudyNet platform.Submitted Versio

WSN and RFID integration to support intelligent monitoring in smart buildings using hybrid intelligent decision support systems

The real time monitoring of environment context aware activities is becoming a standard in the service delivery in a wide range of domains (child and elderly care and supervision, logistics, circulation, and other). The safety of people, goods and premises depends on the prompt reaction to potential hazards identified at an early stage to engage appropriate control actions. This requires capturing real time data to process locally at the device level or communicate to backend systems for real time decision making. This research examines the wireless sensor network and radio frequency identification technology integration in smart homes to support advanced safety systems deployed upstream to safety and emergency response. These systems are based on the use of hybrid intelligent decision support systems configured in a multi-distributed architecture enabled by the wireless communication of detection and tracking data to support intelligent real-time monitoring in smart buildings. This paper introduces first the concept of wireless sensor network and radio frequency identification technology integration showing the various options for the task distribution between radio frequency identification and hybrid intelligent decision support systems. This integration is then illustrated in a multi-distributed system architecture to identify motion and control access in a smart building using a room capacity model for occupancy and evacuation, access rights and a navigation map automatically generated by the system. The solution shown in the case study is based on a virtual layout of the smart building which is implemented using the capabilities of the building information model and hybrid intelligent decision support system.The Saudi High Education Ministry and Brunel University (UK

Internet of Things-aided Smart Grid: Technologies, Architectures, Applications, Prototypes, and Future Research Directions

Traditional power grids are being transformed into Smart Grids (SGs) to address the issues in existing power system due to uni-directional information flow, energy wastage, growing energy demand, reliability and security. SGs offer bi-directional energy flow between service providers and consumers, involving power generation, transmission, distribution and utilization systems. SGs employ various devices for the monitoring, analysis and control of the grid, deployed at power plants, distribution centers and in consumers' premises in a very large number. Hence, an SG requires connectivity, automation and the tracking of such devices. This is achieved with the help of Internet of Things (IoT). IoT helps SG systems to support various network functions throughout the generation, transmission, distribution and consumption of energy by incorporating IoT devices (such as sensors, actuators and smart meters), as well as by providing the connectivity, automation and tracking for such devices. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey on IoT-aided SG systems, which includes the existing architectures, applications and prototypes of IoT-aided SG systems. This survey also highlights the open issues, challenges and future research directions for IoT-aided SG systems

Hierarchical video surveillance architecture: a chassis for video big data analytics and exploration

There is increasing reliance on video surveillance systems for systematic derivation, analysis and interpretation of the data needed for predicting, planning, evaluating and implementing public safety. This is evident from the massive number of surveillance cameras deployed across public locations. For example, in July 2013, the British Security Industry Association (BSIA) reported that over 4 million CCTV cameras had been installed in Britain alone. The BSIA also reveal that only 1.5% of these are state owned. In this paper, we propose a framework that allows access to data from privately owned cameras, with the aim of increasing the efficiency and accuracy of public safety planning, security activities, and decision support systems that are based on video integrated surveillance systems. The accuracy of results obtained from government-owned public safety infrastructure would improve greatly if privately owned surveillance systems ‘expose’ relevant video-generated metadata events, such as triggered alerts and also permit query of a metadata repository. Subsequently, a police officer, for example, with an appropriate level of system permission can query unified video systems across a large geographical area such as a city or a country to predict the location of an interesting entity, such as a pedestrian or a vehicle. This becomes possible with our proposed novel hierarchical architecture, the Fused Video Surveillance Architecture (FVSA). At the high level, FVSA comprises of a hardware framework that is supported by a multi-layer abstraction software interface. It presents video surveillance systems as an adapted computational grid of intelligent services, which is integration-enabled to communicate with other compatible systems in the Internet of Things (IoT)

Using computer vision in security applications

In this paper we present projects developed in the Computer Vision Laboratory, which address the issue of safety. First, we present the Internet Video Server (IVS) monitoring system [5] that sends live video stream over the Internet and enables remote camera control. Its extension GlobalView [1,6], which incorporates intuitive user interface for remote camera control, is based on panoramic image. Then we describe our method for automatic face detection [3] based on color segmentation and feature extraction. Finally, we introduce our SecurityAgent system [4] for automatic surveillance of observed location