Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239311
M. Ramesh, K. V. Nibi, Anupama Kurup, R. Mohan, A. Aiswarya, A. Arsha, P. Sarang
Poor water quality in Pettipalam Colony in Thalassery, Kannur District, Kerala is the source of many health issues among the colony residents. Soil and water contamination due to the accumulation of waste is another serious issue that adversely affects the health of the inhabitants in the area. There is a compelling need for the village inhabitants to appropriately monitor the water bodies and take suitable measures to dispose of the waste in the area. Over 2 acres of land is inhabited by people in Pettipalam Colony at Thalassery. Their colony ground was used as a municipal waste dump yard until 2014. Presently, also, the colony residents use the area for waste disposal and open defecation, thus contaminating the land and soil with plastic, organic, and chemical pollutants, etc. These contaminants affect the ground water and get washed into the water bodies when it rains, thus polluting the water resources. Techniques such as Bio-remediation (use of microorganisms to remove or neutralize pollutants) and vermi-composting, which triggers growth of plants that absorb the contaminants, can be introduced to address the issue of reducing the level of contaminants in the soil. But these solutions require proper identification of the contaminants. An extensive sensor system, which can monitor the contaminants in the soil as well as the water bodies, is essential. This project aims to design and develop an IoT based system that can sense the environmental parameters and effectively deliver information on the level of contamination and the quality of the water. Sensors to detect the hydrocarbons, chemical and metal content in the soil can be integrated into a soil probe for monitoring the soil contamination. And sensors for detecting pH, conductivity, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, etc. can be used for monitoring the water quality in the rivers, ponds, etc. in the site of interest. The design, development and implementation of an IoT based system will help the authorities take the necessary steps to perform proper waste management of the affected area. We anticipate that monitoring the suitable parameters will help to impact land restoration initiatives in many areas of India.
{"title":"Water quality monitoring and waste management using IoT","authors":"M. Ramesh, K. V. Nibi, Anupama Kurup, R. Mohan, A. Aiswarya, A. Arsha, P. Sarang","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239311","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239311","url":null,"abstract":"Poor water quality in Pettipalam Colony in Thalassery, Kannur District, Kerala is the source of many health issues among the colony residents. Soil and water contamination due to the accumulation of waste is another serious issue that adversely affects the health of the inhabitants in the area. There is a compelling need for the village inhabitants to appropriately monitor the water bodies and take suitable measures to dispose of the waste in the area. Over 2 acres of land is inhabited by people in Pettipalam Colony at Thalassery. Their colony ground was used as a municipal waste dump yard until 2014. Presently, also, the colony residents use the area for waste disposal and open defecation, thus contaminating the land and soil with plastic, organic, and chemical pollutants, etc. These contaminants affect the ground water and get washed into the water bodies when it rains, thus polluting the water resources. Techniques such as Bio-remediation (use of microorganisms to remove or neutralize pollutants) and vermi-composting, which triggers growth of plants that absorb the contaminants, can be introduced to address the issue of reducing the level of contaminants in the soil. But these solutions require proper identification of the contaminants. An extensive sensor system, which can monitor the contaminants in the soil as well as the water bodies, is essential. This project aims to design and develop an IoT based system that can sense the environmental parameters and effectively deliver information on the level of contamination and the quality of the water. Sensors to detect the hydrocarbons, chemical and metal content in the soil can be integrated into a soil probe for monitoring the soil contamination. And sensors for detecting pH, conductivity, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, etc. can be used for monitoring the water quality in the rivers, ponds, etc. in the site of interest. The design, development and implementation of an IoT based system will help the authorities take the necessary steps to perform proper waste management of the affected area. We anticipate that monitoring the suitable parameters will help to impact land restoration initiatives in many areas of India.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"12 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115255583","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239224
Letícia Palazzi Perez, R. B. Santos, Guadalupe M. J. A. de Almeida, Guilherme Carpintero Carvalho
Brazil has 5.570 cities politically independent and yet entitled to manage urban land, no matter their technical or financial resources for that. Although informal land tenure is commonly associated to major metropolitan areas in Brazil, recent urbanization processes of cities inward the country's territory has led to informal land occupation of entire central districts. Informality is defined, in this context, as a condition whereby individual households are not legally recognized and tenure itself is frequently disputed, sometimes violently. Land tenure regularization is the also first step to solve the precariousness. In addition to land disputes, informal urban land occupation severely limits access to public services and facilities such as mail or water supply, for example. This article focuses on an innovative technical solution inspired by the “fit for purpose” tool for managing land, suggested by multilateral agencies such as Global Land Tool Network (GLTN). The inexpensive and replicable methodology is based both on intuitive mapping and editing tools and satellite images in a Geographic Information System. It was applied for one in many Brazilian recently and fast growing cities facing informality, yet with limited resources to address it through land regularization: Buritirana The case study was drawn from a nationwide sample of 200 local governments of national program for urban land tenure regularization, called “Papel Passado”, established in 2016, conducted in partnership between Ministry of Cities and the Federal University of ABC and could be easily be extended as a national policy urban development and resolution of land conflicts.
{"title":"Spatial data in the Global South: A case study of alternative land management tools for cities with limited resources","authors":"Letícia Palazzi Perez, R. B. Santos, Guadalupe M. J. A. de Almeida, Guilherme Carpintero Carvalho","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239224","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239224","url":null,"abstract":"Brazil has 5.570 cities politically independent and yet entitled to manage urban land, no matter their technical or financial resources for that. Although informal land tenure is commonly associated to major metropolitan areas in Brazil, recent urbanization processes of cities inward the country's territory has led to informal land occupation of entire central districts. Informality is defined, in this context, as a condition whereby individual households are not legally recognized and tenure itself is frequently disputed, sometimes violently. Land tenure regularization is the also first step to solve the precariousness. In addition to land disputes, informal urban land occupation severely limits access to public services and facilities such as mail or water supply, for example. This article focuses on an innovative technical solution inspired by the “fit for purpose” tool for managing land, suggested by multilateral agencies such as Global Land Tool Network (GLTN). The inexpensive and replicable methodology is based both on intuitive mapping and editing tools and satellite images in a Geographic Information System. It was applied for one in many Brazilian recently and fast growing cities facing informality, yet with limited resources to address it through land regularization: Buritirana The case study was drawn from a nationwide sample of 200 local governments of national program for urban land tenure regularization, called “Papel Passado”, established in 2016, conducted in partnership between Ministry of Cities and the Federal University of ABC and could be easily be extended as a national policy urban development and resolution of land conflicts.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121246657","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239275
Gandhi Rajan, Meghana Kavakuntala, V. S. Rajkumar, S. Gnanavel, Vineeth Vijayaraghavan
This paper proposes an enhanced three step design framework for microgrids designed with fixed capacity shortages (CS) that optimizes cost using load prioritization, battery thresholds and predicted solar data in the design phase instead of operational phase to reduce capital expenditure. This is achieved through reduction in battery size. The framework uses HOMER to model microgrids that are cost optimized for a given CS and installation location. As the first step of the redesign, load prioritization is used to resize the system into a new configuration, termed as Default System Size (DSS). The battery size in DSS is subsequently optimized over second and third stages of design. The second stage, Battery Threshold Management (BTM) uses efficiencies brought about by setting battery thresholds using load information for a 24-hour autonomy. In the third step — Prediction Management (PM), the operational efficiency brought about by solar generation prediction data is incorporated into the design framework. The proposed framework is validated using 6 individual microgrids set in different rural Indian locations.
本文提出了一个改进的三步设计框架，用于设计具有固定容量短缺(CS)的微电网，该框架在设计阶段而不是运行阶段使用负载优先级、电池阈值和预测太阳能数据来优化成本，以减少资本支出。这是通过缩小电池尺寸来实现的。该框架使用HOMER对给定CS和安装位置成本优化的微电网进行建模。作为重新设计的第一步，负载优先级用于将系统调整为新的配置，称为默认系统大小(Default system Size, DSS)。DSS中的电池尺寸随后在设计的第二和第三阶段进行优化。第二阶段，电池阈值管理(BTM)利用利用负载信息设置电池阈值带来的效率，实现24小时自治。第三步预测管理(PM)，将太阳能发电预测数据带来的运行效率纳入设计框架。所提出的框架通过在印度不同农村地区设置的6个单独的微电网进行了验证。
{"title":"Rural Indian microgrid design optimization — Intelligent battery sizing","authors":"Gandhi Rajan, Meghana Kavakuntala, V. S. Rajkumar, S. Gnanavel, Vineeth Vijayaraghavan","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239275","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239275","url":null,"abstract":"This paper proposes an enhanced three step design framework for microgrids designed with fixed capacity shortages (CS) that optimizes cost using load prioritization, battery thresholds and predicted solar data in the design phase instead of operational phase to reduce capital expenditure. This is achieved through reduction in battery size. The framework uses HOMER to model microgrids that are cost optimized for a given CS and installation location. As the first step of the redesign, load prioritization is used to resize the system into a new configuration, termed as Default System Size (DSS). The battery size in DSS is subsequently optimized over second and third stages of design. The second stage, Battery Threshold Management (BTM) uses efficiencies brought about by setting battery thresholds using load information for a 24-hour autonomy. In the third step — Prediction Management (PM), the operational efficiency brought about by solar generation prediction data is incorporated into the design framework. The proposed framework is validated using 6 individual microgrids set in different rural Indian locations.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"52 357 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126159146","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239302
D. Danley
Hybrid solar / diesel / battery microgrids are being suggested as a solution to rural electrification for many developing countries, even those with existing transmission / distribution networks. One question is how to balance the sizing of the various subsystems. Energy from photovoltaic systems is now far cheaper than even the lowest fuel-only costs for diesel generators. However, solar is only available during the day and is often intermittent, so energy storage is needed to optimize microgrid system performance and economics. With high penetrations of PV, the role of storage has moved from supplying overnight load to the need to capture excess PV energy during the day when load is low. This paper uses a custom time-series model to discuss optimization of solar, energy storage and on-demand-generators for community scale applications ranging from 10 kW to 10 MW of load. The paper also discusses the requirements for energy storage technologies needed to meet this application.
{"title":"Optimization of advanced energy storage for solar-diesel hybrid microgrids","authors":"D. Danley","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239302","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239302","url":null,"abstract":"Hybrid solar / diesel / battery microgrids are being suggested as a solution to rural electrification for many developing countries, even those with existing transmission / distribution networks. One question is how to balance the sizing of the various subsystems. Energy from photovoltaic systems is now far cheaper than even the lowest fuel-only costs for diesel generators. However, solar is only available during the day and is often intermittent, so energy storage is needed to optimize microgrid system performance and economics. With high penetrations of PV, the role of storage has moved from supplying overnight load to the need to capture excess PV energy during the day when load is low. This paper uses a custom time-series model to discuss optimization of solar, energy storage and on-demand-generators for community scale applications ranging from 10 kW to 10 MW of load. The paper also discusses the requirements for energy storage technologies needed to meet this application.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"39 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122898311","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239263
D. Ekong, P. Fontelo
Advances in mobile technologies have led to the use of mobile devices in telemedicine. Examples include smartphones for capturing microscopic images from glass slides for remote telepathology and in teledermatology consultations. As use of smartphones become even more pervasive in developing countries where expert medical consultation is greatly needed, telemedicine, such as telepathology and telemicroscopy consultations will become more feasible even in the most remote locations. In this paper, we report on our experience on an early evaluation of prototype systems that use the Raspberry Pi with mobile devices for telepathology consultation. We present some alternatives for connecting the Raspberry Pi to the Internet along with their performance measurements.
{"title":"Prototype telepathology solutions that use the Raspberry Pi and mobile devices","authors":"D. Ekong, P. Fontelo","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239263","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239263","url":null,"abstract":"Advances in mobile technologies have led to the use of mobile devices in telemedicine. Examples include smartphones for capturing microscopic images from glass slides for remote telepathology and in teledermatology consultations. As use of smartphones become even more pervasive in developing countries where expert medical consultation is greatly needed, telemedicine, such as telepathology and telemicroscopy consultations will become more feasible even in the most remote locations. In this paper, we report on our experience on an early evaluation of prototype systems that use the Raspberry Pi with mobile devices for telepathology consultation. We present some alternatives for connecting the Raspberry Pi to the Internet along with their performance measurements.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"166 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121062933","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239242
M. Khan
This study investigates use of acoustic signals to detect cracks in polyvinyl chloride (PVC) sewer pipes. Cracked sewer pipes can result in release of untreated human and industrial waste, toxic materials and debris affecting human health and the environment. The released toxic effluents can pollute water reservoirs and damage public and private property. Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) pipes have been extensively used in sewer systems for the past several decades. These pipes fail due to improper installation and engineering, incorrect operation, internal and external contamination, manufacturing defects and abuse by the users. Existing industry standard for crack detection in sewer pipes is based on a Closed-circuit television (CCTV) mounted crawler that passes through the sewer pipes and relays the video to an operator who visually observes and records the presence of cracks. This method requires a special vehicle, an electric generator, a reel-mounted data link cable and a customized software with a dedicated control system. There is a need for developing a system that can be easily deployable, economical and consistent in detecting cracks in pipes. The aim of this project is to analyze and relate attenuation in the acoustic signal to the condition of a pipe sample. Extensive empirical testing has been conducted on 0.1 m diameter PVC pipes with and without cracks. The preliminary results show that acoustic frequencies between 800 Hz–1.2 kHz are severely attenuated due to signal loss from cracks. Further testing in the laboratory and field is in progress to classify the location and extent of cracks in pipes. The findings from the study can be used to develop an acoustic based pipeline crack detection application.
{"title":"An approach for crack detection in sewer pipes using acoustic signals","authors":"M. Khan","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239242","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239242","url":null,"abstract":"This study investigates use of acoustic signals to detect cracks in polyvinyl chloride (PVC) sewer pipes. Cracked sewer pipes can result in release of untreated human and industrial waste, toxic materials and debris affecting human health and the environment. The released toxic effluents can pollute water reservoirs and damage public and private property. Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) pipes have been extensively used in sewer systems for the past several decades. These pipes fail due to improper installation and engineering, incorrect operation, internal and external contamination, manufacturing defects and abuse by the users. Existing industry standard for crack detection in sewer pipes is based on a Closed-circuit television (CCTV) mounted crawler that passes through the sewer pipes and relays the video to an operator who visually observes and records the presence of cracks. This method requires a special vehicle, an electric generator, a reel-mounted data link cable and a customized software with a dedicated control system. There is a need for developing a system that can be easily deployable, economical and consistent in detecting cracks in pipes. The aim of this project is to analyze and relate attenuation in the acoustic signal to the condition of a pipe sample. Extensive empirical testing has been conducted on 0.1 m diameter PVC pipes with and without cracks. The preliminary results show that acoustic frequencies between 800 Hz–1.2 kHz are severely attenuated due to signal loss from cracks. Further testing in the laboratory and field is in progress to classify the location and extent of cracks in pipes. The findings from the study can be used to develop an acoustic based pipeline crack detection application.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"42 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128660462","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239323
A. Retamar, G. Guba, G. V. Lopez, Harold Bryan Paler, Joven Javier, Felan Carlo C. Garcia, Jeanette Badong-Carlos, Jericho Capito, Ian C. Mosquera, M. D. Paz, Jasmin Jane Yabut
This paper presents the development and national deployment of hydro-meteorological monitoring devices, termed as HydroMet Stations, for flood warning and monitoring applications. We describe various challenges encountered during the course of implementation particularly those related to transportation, local logistics, location, and security. We also discussed lessons learned such as the early involvement of stakeholders, the modification of the design to further protect the sensors from observed issues that came up during implementation, as well as those related to local community engagements. Information, Education and Communication (IEC) Campaign was also discussed as a mode of information dissemination to communities for the currently deployed system consisting of 1,834 HydroMet stations. Likewise, various instances and use cases were enumerated stemming from end-users that have utilized the data for use in public service, research, and academic work. This includes government agencies, research institutes, academia, and other government-funded projects. Finally, a set of recommendations and next steps relevant to operation and further system improvements were discussed.
{"title":"HydroMet: Deployment of a large scale nationwide hydrometeorological sensor network for flood warning and monitoring","authors":"A. Retamar, G. Guba, G. V. Lopez, Harold Bryan Paler, Joven Javier, Felan Carlo C. Garcia, Jeanette Badong-Carlos, Jericho Capito, Ian C. Mosquera, M. D. Paz, Jasmin Jane Yabut","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239323","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239323","url":null,"abstract":"This paper presents the development and national deployment of hydro-meteorological monitoring devices, termed as HydroMet Stations, for flood warning and monitoring applications. We describe various challenges encountered during the course of implementation particularly those related to transportation, local logistics, location, and security. We also discussed lessons learned such as the early involvement of stakeholders, the modification of the design to further protect the sensors from observed issues that came up during implementation, as well as those related to local community engagements. Information, Education and Communication (IEC) Campaign was also discussed as a mode of information dissemination to communities for the currently deployed system consisting of 1,834 HydroMet stations. Likewise, various instances and use cases were enumerated stemming from end-users that have utilized the data for use in public service, research, and academic work. This includes government agencies, research institutes, academia, and other government-funded projects. Finally, a set of recommendations and next steps relevant to operation and further system improvements were discussed.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"117059163","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239312
S. Awara, R. Malik, David C. Garrett, A. B. Arfi
In the spring of 2013, Alberta experienced significant flooding. According to the government of Alberta, this flood was “the largest and most expensive natural disaster in Alberta's history” [1]. Siksika Nation was severely impacted, with almost 170 homes devastated by the flood [2]. Recovery was slow, with many families left in temporary housing or without power for several years. A community engagement program developed by the IEEE Southern Alberta Section has been taking place on the Siksika First Nation reservation. A student team from the University of Calgary with the IEEE Special Interest Group on Humanitarian Technology (SIGHT) affinity is leading these activities. The IEEE volunteers are currently working with the reservation's community members to build an astronomical observatory located in a dark area as part of the educational program. The team worked on installing an off-the-grid solar kit to power the observatory. The solar kit was assembled and tested by the students at the university and then installed at the observatory. After the installation of the solar kit, the community members will be trained to maintain the solar kit system while using the telescopes for observation.
{"title":"Solar powered observatory for educational activities","authors":"S. Awara, R. Malik, David C. Garrett, A. B. Arfi","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239312","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239312","url":null,"abstract":"In the spring of 2013, Alberta experienced significant flooding. According to the government of Alberta, this flood was “the largest and most expensive natural disaster in Alberta's history” [1]. Siksika Nation was severely impacted, with almost 170 homes devastated by the flood [2]. Recovery was slow, with many families left in temporary housing or without power for several years. A community engagement program developed by the IEEE Southern Alberta Section has been taking place on the Siksika First Nation reservation. A student team from the University of Calgary with the IEEE Special Interest Group on Humanitarian Technology (SIGHT) affinity is leading these activities. The IEEE volunteers are currently working with the reservation's community members to build an astronomical observatory located in a dark area as part of the educational program. The team worked on installing an off-the-grid solar kit to power the observatory. The solar kit was assembled and tested by the students at the university and then installed at the observatory. After the installation of the solar kit, the community members will be trained to maintain the solar kit system while using the telescopes for observation.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"91 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115498079","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239309
Karen Mac, Taylor Maya Tromburg, Michele T. Parker, N. Morrison, Samantha O'Connor, Callie Weber, U. Kim
Human breast milk is considered the gold standard for infant nutrition, as breast milk is the only substance that is able to provide infants with the necessary nutrients in their first six months of life. Infants who are fed mother's breast milk are at lower risk for developing a variety of infections and autoimmune diseases and often display better developmental and cognitive performance compared to infants who are not fed breast milk. Most notably, studies have shown that breastfeeding could prevent up to 13% of child deaths worldwide [5]. However, many women are unable to breastfeed for a variety of reasons, including immuno-compromised status due to diseases such as HIV/AIDS, lack of time, or cultural pressures to use infant formula. In an attempt to solve this problem, there has been a global emergence of human breast milk banks that receive breast milk from screened donors and pasteurize the donated breast milk for distribution. However, the process of ensuring that donor milk is safe for use through pasteurization and screening via bacterial culturing is costly and time-consuming. Accordingly, a standardized implementation of the process has ranged widely. Furthermore, there are a lack of universal guidelines regarding the processing and treatment of breast milk donations around the world. This paper presents a comprehensive review detailing the different methods of pasteurization (including the Holder Method and flash pasteurization) and screening (such as Dornic acidity, bacterial culturing, and crematocrit method) at human milk banks in both developed and developing countries. Understanding different practices worldwide will help in identifying gaps in current efforts to ensure the safety of donated milk, highlighting areas for possible technology development and implementation. Our review demonstrates that few, if any solutions, currently exist for screening donated milk in a cost-effective and efficient manner.
{"title":"Screening donated breast milk in the developing world: Market evaluation and needs identification for rapid and sustainable methods of screening donated milk at human milk banks","authors":"Karen Mac, Taylor Maya Tromburg, Michele T. Parker, N. Morrison, Samantha O'Connor, Callie Weber, U. Kim","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239309","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239309","url":null,"abstract":"Human breast milk is considered the gold standard for infant nutrition, as breast milk is the only substance that is able to provide infants with the necessary nutrients in their first six months of life. Infants who are fed mother's breast milk are at lower risk for developing a variety of infections and autoimmune diseases and often display better developmental and cognitive performance compared to infants who are not fed breast milk. Most notably, studies have shown that breastfeeding could prevent up to 13% of child deaths worldwide [5]. However, many women are unable to breastfeed for a variety of reasons, including immuno-compromised status due to diseases such as HIV/AIDS, lack of time, or cultural pressures to use infant formula. In an attempt to solve this problem, there has been a global emergence of human breast milk banks that receive breast milk from screened donors and pasteurize the donated breast milk for distribution. However, the process of ensuring that donor milk is safe for use through pasteurization and screening via bacterial culturing is costly and time-consuming. Accordingly, a standardized implementation of the process has ranged widely. Furthermore, there are a lack of universal guidelines regarding the processing and treatment of breast milk donations around the world. This paper presents a comprehensive review detailing the different methods of pasteurization (including the Holder Method and flash pasteurization) and screening (such as Dornic acidity, bacterial culturing, and crematocrit method) at human milk banks in both developed and developing countries. Understanding different practices worldwide will help in identifying gaps in current efforts to ensure the safety of donated milk, highlighting areas for possible technology development and implementation. Our review demonstrates that few, if any solutions, currently exist for screening donated milk in a cost-effective and efficient manner.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"14 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115531544","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-10-01DOI: 10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239338
Christian Infante, Daniel B. Chamberlain, Rich Fletcher, Yogesh Thorat, R. Kodgule
Cough sound analysis has attracted interest as a potential low-cost diagnostic tool for low-resource settings, where the burden of pulmonary disease is quite high. However, published results on cough sound analysis are generally limited to specific pulmonary diseases (e.g. detection of Whooping cough — Pertussis) and the study sizes are small. In this paper, we present a general framework for cough sound analysis, which includes automatic cough segmentation, feature extraction and a general classification design that can be applied to a wide range of pulmonary diseases. For our analysis, three evidence-based features were selected (variance, kurtosis, and zero crossing irregularity) as well as an additional feature that we developed (rate of decay). Our cough sound analysis framework was tested using voluntary cough data collected from 54 patients presenting a combination of pulmonary conditions (COPD, asthma, and allergic rhinitis) equally sampled from all patients arriving at a pulmonary clinic, as well as 33 healthy individuals. All study subjects were examined with a stethoscope auscultation, clinical questionnaire, and peak flow meter, and were given a full pulmonary function test (spirometer, body plethysmograph, DLCO), which was the gold standard used to determine each patient's diagnosis. When the classifiers were trained using cough sounds alone, the accuracy (as determined by the AUC of the ROC curve) was 74% for Healthy vs Unhealthy, 80% for Obstructive vs non-Obstructive, and 81% for Asthma vs COPD. We also compared the performance of our cough sound analysis against other low-cost diagnostic tools and observed that cough sounds surprisingly had better performance than lung sound auscultation alone, but had significantly lower performance compared to our clinical questionnaire or peak flow meter test. From these data, we conclude that cough sounds have value as a rapid and simple screening tool, but are of less diagnostic value compared to a clinical questionnaire or peak flow meter.
{"title":"Use of cough sounds for diagnosis and screening of pulmonary disease","authors":"Christian Infante, Daniel B. Chamberlain, Rich Fletcher, Yogesh Thorat, R. Kodgule","doi":"10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239338","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/GHTC.2017.8239338","url":null,"abstract":"Cough sound analysis has attracted interest as a potential low-cost diagnostic tool for low-resource settings, where the burden of pulmonary disease is quite high. However, published results on cough sound analysis are generally limited to specific pulmonary diseases (e.g. detection of Whooping cough — Pertussis) and the study sizes are small. In this paper, we present a general framework for cough sound analysis, which includes automatic cough segmentation, feature extraction and a general classification design that can be applied to a wide range of pulmonary diseases. For our analysis, three evidence-based features were selected (variance, kurtosis, and zero crossing irregularity) as well as an additional feature that we developed (rate of decay). Our cough sound analysis framework was tested using voluntary cough data collected from 54 patients presenting a combination of pulmonary conditions (COPD, asthma, and allergic rhinitis) equally sampled from all patients arriving at a pulmonary clinic, as well as 33 healthy individuals. All study subjects were examined with a stethoscope auscultation, clinical questionnaire, and peak flow meter, and were given a full pulmonary function test (spirometer, body plethysmograph, DLCO), which was the gold standard used to determine each patient's diagnosis. When the classifiers were trained using cough sounds alone, the accuracy (as determined by the AUC of the ROC curve) was 74% for Healthy vs Unhealthy, 80% for Obstructive vs non-Obstructive, and 81% for Asthma vs COPD. We also compared the performance of our cough sound analysis against other low-cost diagnostic tools and observed that cough sounds surprisingly had better performance than lung sound auscultation alone, but had significantly lower performance compared to our clinical questionnaire or peak flow meter test. From these data, we conclude that cough sounds have value as a rapid and simple screening tool, but are of less diagnostic value compared to a clinical questionnaire or peak flow meter.","PeriodicalId":248924,"journal":{"name":"2017 IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC)","volume":"7 4","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114124683","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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