Details of Grant

EPSRC Reference:

EP/C014677/1

Title:

NEMO: Networked Embedded Models and Memories of Physical Work Activity

Principal Investigator:

Other Investigators:

Ball, Professor L	Busby, Dr J	Finney, Dr J
Gellersen, Professor H	Hutchison, Professor D	Davies, Professor N

Researcher Co-Investigators:

Project Partners:

Agilent Technologies Ltd	BP	Carillion
In Touch Ltd

Department:

Computing & Communications

Organisation:

Lancaster University

Scheme:

Standard Research (Pre-FEC)

Starts:

01 October 2005

Ends:

30 September 2009

Value (£):

1,057,611

EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:

Human-Computer Interactions	Mobile Computing
Networks & Distributed Systems

EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:

Communications

Related Grants:

Panel History:

Summary on Grant Application Form

Modern work environments are well supported by ICT systems, but they largely abstract from the details and dynamics of actual work activity. As a consequence, important aspects of physical work such as adherence to safety procedures and traceability of activity are not supported. The NEMO project aims to address this problem by laying the foundation for ubiquitous activity support systems encompassing wireless sensing capabilities and networked embedded technologies. The project will investigate ubiquitous activity support from a technology, management, and human-factors point of view, and focus on safety-critical systems as application domain.The project's vision is to network physical entities such as tools, artefacts and goods, to the effect that these provide1) timely context information concerning their use, handling or processing, as platform for collaborative in situ decision making, and2) life-long entity memories of activities and events, as platform for long-term analyses and activity accounts.For illustration, consider a chemicals container that is not only instrumented with sensors for data collection, but also possesses domain knowledge (e.g. on compatibility with other chemicals) and inference capabilities (e.g. to reason about potential hazards). Such a container would be able to provide dynamic models of its situation in the world at a semantically rich level, and keep life-long records of its use and handling. Furthermore, these models and memories can be dynamically combined with those of other containers to generate collective evidence of activity, for instance when they happen to be present in the same situation.The realization of such ubiquitous activity support systems raises important research questions in areas such as ubiquitous & context-aware computing, embedded networking & wireless sensor networks, psychology and human-computer interaction, and management science & organizational theory. The aim of this interdisciplinary project is to lay the foundation for ubiquitous activity support systems / both in terms of practical provision of tools and platforms, and in understanding of the impact of these systems on the behaviour and perception of human actors and processes within organizations.

Key Findings

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Potential use in non-academic contexts

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Impacts

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Summary
Date Materialised

Sectors submitted by the Researcher

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Project URL:

Further Information:

Organisation Website:

http://www.lancs.ac.uk