A nonlinear control method for price-based demand response program in smart grid

This paper proposes a price-based demand response program by the nonlinear control method. The demand response program is formulated as a nonlinear power management system with price feedback. We give the conditions of the price parameters for both the global asymptotic stability of the system and the social welfare optimality of the equilibrium point. Furthermore, the system is shown to be input-to-state (ISS) stable when there are additive disturbances on the power measurements and the price, and the discrete-time implementation of the power management system is given. Simulation results demonstrate the balance between supply and demand and the stability of the system with and without disturbances.     

A novel communication system approach for a Smart City based on the human nervous system

The massive introduction of internet, architect of the Internet of Thingsparadigm, was expected to facilitate the spread of people out of the urban spaces. However, the reality is that increasingly people are moving to cities, which generates many challenges for the cities of tomorrow. In this context, the Smart Cityconcept emerges, where Information and Communication Technologies have a key role. This situation has revealed an important issue that needs to be addressed: the lack of an ubiquitous communication architecture able to deal with the expected requirements of a SC. To this end, a wide review of the existing communication frameworks and city services have been performed, which showed that existing proposals are classical fixed ad-hocsolutions for very specific problems with no resilience and common thread. By rethinking the nature of cities and considering them as living organisms, it is possible to relate the nervous systems with the communication architecture of a city. Therefore, this work proposes a novel communication architecture, ubiquitous and resilient, inspired in the human nervous system by the definition of Smart Gateways, able to satisfy the needs of a real SCand adaptable to the growing and specific requirements of every single city. Additionally, the research also includes the simulation of the communication channel with different technologies.     

Integrated Multimedia City Data (iMCD): A composite survey and sensing approach to understanding urban living and mobility

We describe the Integrated Multimedia City Data (iMCD), a data platform involving detailed person-level self-reported and sensed information, with additional Internet, remote sensing, crowdsourced and environmental data sources that measure the wider social, economic and physical context of the participant. Selected aspects of the platform, which covers the Glasgow, UK, city-region, are available to other researchers, and allows knowledge discovery on critical urban living themes, for example in transportation, lifelong learning, sustainable behavior, social cohesion, ways of being in a digital age, and other topics. It further allows research into the technological and methodological aspects of emerging forms of urban data. Key highlights of the platform include a multi-topic household and person-level survey; travel and activity diaries; a privacy and personal device sensitivity survey; a rich set of GPS trajectory data; accelerometer, light intensity and other personal environment sensor data from wearable devices; an image data collection at approximately 5-second resolution of participants’ daily lives; multiple forms of text-based and multimedia Internet data; high resolution satellite and LiDAR data; and data from transportation, weather and air quality sensors. We demonstrate the power of the platform in understanding personal behavior and urban patterns by means of three examples: an examination of the links between mobility and literacy/learning using the household survey, a social media analysis of urban activity patterns, and finally, the degree of physical isolation levels using deep learning algorithms on image data. The analysis highlights the importance of purposefully designed multi-construct and multi-instrument data collection approaches that are driven by theoretical frameworks underpinning complex urban challenges, and the need to link to policy frameworks (e.g., Smart Cities, Future Cities, UNESCO Learning Cities agendas) that have the potential to translate data to impactful decision-making.     

Energy recovery in SUDS towards smart water grids: A case study

The development of a methodology for urban flood adaptation and energy recovery solutions is resting on the concept of Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SUDS) as a measure to reduce risks of urban flooding while fully utilizing the available resources. Flood drainage systems are infrastructures essential in urban areas, which include retention ponds that can be used as water storage volumes to damp floods and simultaneously to produce energy, constituting innovative solutions to be integrated in future smart water grid′s designs.The consideration of urban flooding as a problem caused by excess water that can be harvested and re-used is expected to provide a comprehensive representation of a water-energy nexus for future urban areas. The study comprises an optimization of energy recovery in SUDS of a small district area of Lisbon down-town through the use of a low-head hydropower converter.The status-quo solution based on a basin catchment for the average expected runoff is analysed, with influence of the tidal backwater effect of the Atlantic Ocean which causes difficulties to the drainage of excess flow. The methodology used to reach the flow damping and the optimized solution for energy production is presented.     

应用校园卡的智能储物柜

超市、商场等场所为方便用户存储物品,常需设置电子储物柜。这种储物柜虽然能满足校园师生日常使用,但它的解码凭条容易丢失还会产生污染,在管理方面也有极大不便。本文将校园卡,储物柜和智能系统相互结合,以实现灵活使用、安全系数高、环保的智能储物柜系统。     

Development of user customized smart keyboard using Smart Product Design-Finite Element Analysis Process in the Internet of Things

In a hyper-connected society, IoT environment, markets are rapidly changing as smartphones penetrate global market. As smartphones are applied to various digital media, development of a novel smart product is required. In this paper, a Smart Product Design-Finite Element Analysis Process (SPD-FEAP) is developed to adopt fast-changing tends and user requirements that can be visually verified. The user requirements are derived and quantitatively evaluated from Smart Quality Function Deployment (SQFD) using WebData. Then the usage scenarios are created according to the priority of the functions derived from SQFD. 3D shape analysis by Finite Element Analysis (FEA) was conducted and printed out through Rapid Prototyping (RP) technology to identify any possible errors. Thus, a User Customized Smart Keyboard has been developed using SPD-FEAP.     

Quality and the efficiency of data in “Smart-Cities”

As a new form of sustainable development, the concept “Smart Cities” knows a large expansion during the recent years. It represents an urban model, refers to all alternative approaches to metropolitan ICTs case to enhance quality and performance of urban service for better interaction between citizens and government. However, the smart cities based on distributed and autonomous information infrastructure contains millions of information sources that will be expected more than 50 billion devices connected by using IoT or other similar technologies in 2020. In Information Technology, we often need to process and reason with information coming from various sources (sensors, experts, models). Information is almost always tainted with various kinds of imperfection: imprecision, uncertainty, ambiguity, we need a theoretical framework general enough to allow for the representation, propagation and combination of all kinds of imperfect information. The theory of belief functions is one such Framework. Real-time data generated from autonomous and distributed sources can contain all sorts of imperfections regarding on the quality of data e.g. imprecision, uncertainty, ignorance and/or incompleteness. Any imperfection in data within smart city can have an adverse effect over the performance of urban services and decision making. In this context, we address in this article the problem of imperfection in smart city data. We will focus on handling imperfection during the process of information retrieval and data integration and we will create an evidential database by using the evidence theory in order to improve the efficiency of smart city. The expected outcomes from this paper are (1) to focus on handling imperfection during the process of information retrieval and data integration (2) to create an evidential database by using the evidence theory in order to improve the efficiency of smart city. As experimentation we present a special case of modeling imperfect data in the field of Healthcare. An evidential database will be built which will contain all the perfect and imperfect data. These data come from several Heterogeneous sources in a context of Smart Cities. Imperfect aspects in the evidential database expressed by the theory of beliefs that will present in this paper.     

The underlying factors of the perceived usefulness of using smart wearable devices for disaster applications

Smart wearable devices offer much potential to assist citizens in disasters. To the general public, however, using these devices for disaster applications is still a novel concept. In disasters, most people are reluctant to rely on unfamiliar technologies. Thus, for these devices to become truly useful in disasters, it is important to understand factors that affect their acceptance by the public. Previous studies show that perceived usefulness is a clear antecedent of people’s acceptance of smart wearable devices. However, the underlying factors that affect perceived usefulness itself are not clearly known. Thus, the aim of this study is to fill this gap, and by doing so, to derive some practical implications for solution developers and governments.This study used structural equation modelling to analyse survey data collected from 647 respondents in Japan. We found that the respondents’ perceived usefulness of the current applications of smart wearable devices was a strong predictor of their perceived usefulness of using these devices for disaster applications. Although indirect factors such as the ownership of ICT gadgets and the usage of social media also had some influences, most of their effects were mediated through increasing the respondents’ perceived usefulness of the current applications. In other words, through appreciating the functions of the current applications of smart wearable devices, people can visualise the usefulness of these devices in disaster situations. That being said, we found that in parallel, people also had concerns on the privacy issues of these devices. These findings shed light on the promotion and development of this fast growing technology for disaster applications.     

An experience of collaboration using a PaaS for the smarter university model

In this paper we continue our previous research on the development of the current model of higher education, which pointed out that the labor market is looking for people with competencies and skills reflecting a T-shape model. As a consequence, universities should include a wider mix of disciplines in the curricula of their courses. Hence, to overcome existing criticisms and to provide some suggestions on how to enhance universities׳ performances, we thought of education as a process with inputs, outputs, and relevant dependencies. We called such a university a “smarter university” in which knowledge is a common heritage of teachers and students. In our research the smarter university model is based on a smart-city-like model, due to the fact that next generation networks and relevant services are going to be more and more integrated with existing infrastructure and information management systems. Thus, it is mandatory that smart solutions are the most prominent assets of modern university environments to improve the effectiveness of higher education. In this paper, we report the experimental results from a specific case study of collaboration between industry and university, which could be used as a reference for the definition of patterns to be applied in the redesign of the current education systems, even though the experiment refers to a technological application scenario.