'Girlfriends and Strawberry Jam’: Tagging Memories, Experiences, and Events for Future Retrieval

In this short paper we have some preliminary thoughts about tagging everyday life events in order to allow future retrieval of events or experiences related to events. Elaboration of these thoughts will be done in the context of the recently started Network of Excellence PetaMedia (Peer-to-Peer Tagged Media) and the Network of Excellence SSPNet (Social Signal Processing), to start in 2009, both funded by the European Commission's Seventh Framework Programme. Descriptions of these networks will be given later in this paper

Smart Brain Interaction Systems for Office Access and Control in Smart City Context

Over the past decade, the term “smart cities” has been worldwide priority for city planning by governments. Planning smart cities implies identifying key drivers for transforming into more convenient, comfortable, and safer life. This requires equipping the cities with appropriate smart technologies and infrastructure. Smart infrastructure is a key component in planning smart cities: smart places, transportation, health and education systems. Smart offices present the concept of workplaces that respond to user’s needs and allow less commitment to routine tasks. Smart offices solutions enable employees to change status of the surrounding environment upon the change of user’s preferences using the changes in the user’s biometrics measures. Meanwhile, smart office access and control through brain signals is quite recent concept. Hence, smart offices provide access and services availability at each moment using smart personal identification (PI) interfaces that responds only to the personal thoughts/preferences issued by the office employee not any other person. Hence, authentication and control systems could benefit from the biometrics. Yet these systems are facing efficiency and accessibility challenges in terms of unimodality. This chapter addresses those problems and proposes a prototype for multimodal biometric person identification control system for smart office access and control as a solution

Assisting the autistic To reduce anxiety caused by their environment

Many people with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) find certain sounds so unpleasant that their lifestyle can be severely impaired by the need to avoid these noises. This paper considers several common sources of such anxietyinducing noise in the normal home and working environments, and considers whether this problem could be addressed with mechatronic concepts. People with ASD were tested for their reactions to a range of noises, and to the same noises filtered through noise reduction devices. Analysis of the probable characteristics of the anxiety- causing noise features was made. The noises were varying in time and pitch. In addition to anecdotal and survey evidence some carefully structured tests were carried out on some participants using the devices. Based on this investigation, specific mechatronic devices are proposed, using active noise control to selectively soften the sounds, which may be suitably used by those suffering ASD. A smart home or office could deploy multiple devices, in the optimal locations to reduce any offensive noise, whilst preserving a pleasant environment that allows the user the ability to communicate. Furthermore the environment could be tuned to the needs of specific individuals, and switched when they are present

The Internet of Things Will Thrive by 2025

This report is the latest research report in a sustained effort throughout 2014 by the Pew Research Center Internet Project to mark the 25th anniversary of the creation of the World Wide Web by Sir Tim Berners-LeeThis current report is an analysis of opinions about the likely expansion of the Internet of Things (sometimes called the Cloud of Things), a catchall phrase for the array of devices, appliances, vehicles, wearable material, and sensor-laden parts of the environment that connect to each other and feed data back and forth. It covers the over 1,600 responses that were offered specifically about our question about where the Internet of Things would stand by the year 2025. The report is the next in a series of eight Pew Research and Elon University analyses to be issued this year in which experts will share their expectations about the future of such things as privacy, cybersecurity, and net neutrality. It includes some of the best and most provocative of the predictions survey respondents made when specifically asked to share their views about the evolution of embedded and wearable computing and the Internet of Things

Advanced Wireless Sensors Used to Monitor the Impact of Environment Design on Human Physiology

This article describes modern wireless sensor devices and their application in the measurements of the human physiology. We used our own advanced ECG Holter device and EEG helmet to record the heart and brain activity impacted by different environments, materials, colors or body positions during work. In this paper, we want to show the interactions between humans and architecture design, which modify human work performance and well-being. This paper is a conclusion of the 3 different pilot studies, where different scopes of human-space interaction were explored. In the experiments, we aimed mostly at wood materials and their beneficial effects on the nervous system. The research in its actual state is primarily focused on optimizing the methods of the ECG data analysis from our Holter device and the EEG data from helmet. Based on these data, we will improve the methodology of the experiments for the next enhanced research with aspiration to automate data analysis

Robot Betrayal: a guide to the ethics of robotic deception

If a robot sends a deceptive signal to a human user, is this always and everywhere an unethical act, or might it sometimes be ethically desirable? Building upon previous work in robot ethics, this article tries to clarify and refine our understanding of the ethics of robotic deception. It does so by making three arguments. First, it argues that we need to distinguish between three main forms of robotic deception (external state deception; superficial state deception; and hidden state deception) in order to think clearly about its ethics. Second, it argues that the second type of deception – superficial state deception – is not best thought of as a form of deception, even though it is frequently criticised as such. And third, it argues that the third type of deception is best understood as a form of betrayal because doing so captures the unique ethical harm to which it gives rise, and justifies special ethical protections against its use

SciTech News Volume 71, No. 3 (2017)

Columns and Reports From the Editor.........................3 Division News Science-Technology Division....5 Chemistry Division....................8 Conference Report, Marion E, Sparks Professional Development Award Recipient..9 Engineering Division................10 Engineering Division Award, Winners Reflect on their Conference Experience..15 Aerospace Section of the Engineering Division .....18 Architecture, Building Engineering, Construction, and Design Section of the Engineering Division................20 Reviews Sci-Tech Book News Reviews...22 Advertisements IEEE..........................................