Description

Smart Cities: Guaranteeing our Future

On the face of it, the two simple words, “Smart Cities”, seem to imply the obvious: A city made more intelligent to its citizens, through technology. Yet, Smart Cities are anything but simple and obvious. Ask any of the cities, industries or research entities involved in smart city projects, and each will give you a different definition of what is involved in building a Smart City and what its priorities should be. It differs from global region to region; from city to city within a single nation; and over time, depending on the social, economic and political trends of the moment.

From a technology point-of-view, scratch the surface and we see Smart Cities as verticals covering Connectivity, Data, Energy, Transport, Buildings, and Governance. However, dig deeper and it now includes a far more complex and comprehensive vision of cities where we live, work and visit. Take the examples of employment, agriculture, healthcare and social well-being, to name a few. Today’s Smart City is very different one to that designed and developed a generation or so ago. Technology is no longer just a solution for providing more efficient resources and municipality services. Yes, it is still very much that, but it has evolved into something far more panoptic. It has become “People-Centric”, with a strong awareness to improve the many facets of our lives within a city, and provide a well-balanced, healthy and happy life.

It is projected that by 2025 smart cities will be a $1.2 trillion market. This will bring a wealth of incredible technology solutions and opportunities for new economies and job markets to develop and fill the gap in areas where work is dying out. But such positives come with a great responsibility. With over 55% of the world’s population living and working in cities today and two-thirds by 2050, how we use technology in our cities has a huge impact on humanity. We must work hand-in-hand with citizens, engaging their participation from the start of any process of building a smarter city, in order to achieve much wider-spread adoption. We must provide technologies that bring people and social and business communities closer together, physically, not just virtually, so they can thrive. In an environment that is green, secure, protecting our privacy, and which promotes social well-being.

The IEEE IoT Initiative – Smart Cities working group embraces such complexity and has dedicated the last 12 months to redefining the “People-Centric” approach within IEEE, and is currently working on KPIs, guidelines, and towards efforts for revised and new standards.

Our goal during this Smart Cities track, of the IEEE IoT World Forum on IoT,  is to provide a platform for communications and collaboration on the state-of-the art in IoT, not just between industry, government and research, but in reply to its complexity, we are inviting international experts across wider fields to join the conversation: from economics to finance; from healthcare to agriculture; and from urban planning to the environment, in order to provide a clear picture as to where we are today and where we are heading with the future of humankind.

During the 3 days and 9 sessions, the topics (and sub-topics) will cover:

• New Markets: Economics, Strategies and Finance
  Economics – Strategies/Vision – Frameworks – Finance/Budgeting
• Make it “People-Centric”
  Real-Life Connectivity – Citizen Engagement – Transparency – Digital Equity
• Powering our Infrastructures and City Services
  Mobility – Communications – Utilities: Energy, Lighting and Water
• Trends in Urban Planning, Buildings and Sustainability
  Urban Planning – Buildings/Homes – The Environment – eWaste
• Boosting Local Economies: Jobs for Now, Jobs for the Future
  Employment – Education – Local Economies
• Data-driven, but Safe and Secure
  Big Data – 5G – Blockchains – Security/Privacy
• Feeding our Cities and Looking after Us
  Agriculture – Health Care – Social Well-Being
• Achieving a Global Common Framework and Standards
  Workshop
• Concluding Panel
  Panel Leader: Adam Drobot, Chair Vertical and Topical Tracks WF- IoT 2020

Track Co-Chairs

Joel Myers, CEO of Domila Ltd. (Dublin, Ireland)

Co-Chair of the IEEE IoT Initiative Smart Cities Working Group.

Leading technologist specializing in the creation and development of innovation technology solutions in the communications and management of services in Cultural Heritage, Tourism, and since 2015 in Business Networking.

His company, HoozAround Corp. is currently commercialising a mobile application called HoozAround^TM. This App offers very close-proximity networking for users to carry out business and social networking based on profile matching needs or interests in real-time, indoors and outdoors. Its aim is to bring people together that would otherwise never meet, face-to-face, in order to create new and more efficient opportunities to grow personally, socially as a city-wide community and in developing business. The app was successfully piloted at the IFA Berlin consumer electronics trade fair in 2017 and at the IEEE World Forum on IoT in February 2018 (Singapore).

Over the past few years Joel Myers has been focusing on the redefinition of the “Internet of People” exploring the goals of the smart city industry movement juxtaposed with the need for humanity to remain connected as physical people.

The work carried out by Joel Myers has been published in international newspapers and journals such as the BBC, New York Times, Hong Times, the Hindu Times, Wired, and Forbes Magazine.

Rebecca Lee Hammons, Ball State University (Muncie, IN USA)

Dr. Rebecca Hammons is an associate professor in the Center for Information and Communication Sciences at Ball State University. She has extensive technology industry experience in establishing and leading software quality assurance, product development lifecycle services, and project management teams. Strengths include technical leadership, process improvement and automation, predictive analytics for software, and strategic planning.

Dr. Hammons has worked for Ontario Systems, Apple, Raytheon, Tivoli Systems and Wang, in addition to several niche software firms. She is a Certified Quality Manager and Certified Software Quality Engineer with the American Society for Quality (ASQ) and a Certified Scrum Master and Certified Scrum Product Owner with Scrum Alliance. Dr. Hammons received her Ed.D. and M.A. from Ball State University and her B.A. from Michigan State University.

Her dissertation research was in self-directed learning for software quality practitioners. Current technology industry research interests include Slow Tech, Burnout Theory, Internet of Things/Smart Cities, and Gold-Collar Workers. Dr. Hammons thrives on leading organizational change initiatives and coaching individuals and teams to reach their full potential.

Speakers

Narang N. Kishor, Narnix Technolabs Pvt. Ltd, India

Kishor is Technology Consultant, Mentor & Design Architect in Electrical, Electronics & ICT with over 40 years of professional experience in education, research, design and consulting. Over 30 years of hardcore Research and Design Development Experience in Solutions, Systems, Products, Hardware, Software & Firmware (Embedded Software) in fields of Industrial, Power, IT, Telecom, Medical, Energy and Environment, and over 10 years of Consultancy Experience to different segments of business & industry. He has over 200 Research & Design Mentees in the Electronics, ICT & STI Ecosystems. Professionally, he is an Electronics Design Engineer practicing design & development of a wide spectrum of Products, Systems & Solutions as an Independent Design House – NARNIX since 1981.

For last 10 years, deeply involved in Standardization in the Electrical, Electronics, Communication and Information Technology Domains with focus on Identifying Gaps in Standards to address Interoperable Systems & Solutions Deployments and bring Harmonization by defining standardized interfaces to ensure End-to-End Interoperability. Currently leading the Standardization activities as the Chairman of Smart Infrastructure Sectional Committee LITD 28 in BIS the Indian National Standards Body, Vice Chair – Strategy & Convenor – Reference Architecture WG in IEC Systems Committee on Smart Cities, Project Leader – IEC TS 63188 ED1 – Smart Cities Reference Architecture Methodology, Project Leader – IEC 63205 ED1 – Smart Cities Reference Architecture, Member Steering Committee – OCEANIS (The Open Community for Ethics in Autonomous and Intelligent Systems) & Co-Editor – ISO 30145 on Smart City ICT Reference Frameworks…

Currently, Kishor is developing a Comprehensive “5G inclusive ICT Architecture for Critical Infrastructure” and leading the 5G Application Layer Standards development in India.

Brian Miles, CGI, Lafayette, Louisiana, USA

Brian is trained as a software engineer and physical geographer.  His research has focused on hydrology, energy policy, and land use and transportation modeling.  His current work focuses on developing open source, standards-based data management systems for Internet of Things (IoT) solutions, including air quality and water monitoring.

Carlos M. Ferregut, The University of Texas at El Paso

Dr. Ferregut’s expertise lies in the fields of engineering risk analysis, reliability-based design and stochastic modeling. He also has had extended experience on Nondestructive evaluation of engineering systems. Key aspects of his research include the development of dedicated probabilistic models, the study of the effects of statistical and model uncertainties, and the application of both classical (statistical) reliability theory, as well as structural (model-based) reliability analysis. The practical applications of his research are mostly related to civil and aerospace engineering systems, marked by a need to manage, assess, and/or minimize risks. To date, particular emphasis has been given to buildings, pavements, bridges, foundations, aircraft structures and aerospace structures, gas pipelines, ship structures and stochastic modeling of environmental risks, environmental problems, and a probabilistic treatment of the robustness and durability of engineering systems.

Jean Rice, National Telecommunications and Information Administration

Jean Rice is a telecommunications expert and advisor who works with federal agencies, tribal, local and state governments, industry, universities and non-profits on smart cities and communities projects and provides technical assistance to support the widespread deployment of broadband infrastructure. Ms. Rice focuses on the development of cutting-edge, cross-sector smart cities and broadband projects and collaborations and leads NTIA’s partnership with the National Institute of Technology and Standards’ Global Cities Team Challenge program. She focuses on smart agriculture and rural, smart buildings, wireless, smart states, inclusion and smart regions. She is a member of the Networking and Information Technology and Research and Development Program’s Cyber-Physical System’s Interagency Working group and the Federal Smart Grid Task Force and had been a member of the prior NITRD Federal Smart Cities and Communities Task Force. Ms. Rice co-founded and coordinates the Smart Cities and Communities Leadership Forum hosted by NTIA, NIST, NSF, and DHS S&T. Ms. Rice has received several awards including an award from the Commerce Department for leadership in smart cities. She has developed numerous publications, including a number of Toolkits for NTIA, including “Powering a Smart City Through Partnerships; a Toolkit for Local and Tribal governments.” For 25 years, Ms. Rice was the CEO of a telecommunications consulting company for US cities and states. NTIA is responsible for advising the President on Telecommunications and Information Administration policy issues. NITA’s programs and policy making focus on expanding broadband internet access and adoption in the US, expanding the use of spectrum by all users, and ensuring that the Internet remains and engine for continued innovation and economic growth.

Josh Sonnier, CGI, Lafayette, Louisiana, USA

Josh is mathematician and physicist by training with a diverse technical background including pure research, data science, software development, and industrial R&D. After many years in academia, he transitioned to the private sector and continues to enjoy it. He currently leads a team focusing on cloud development, data science, machine learning, and automation at CGI, a global IT company with 77,000 members around the world and over 500 in Lafayette.

Katy Dupre, Consultant, LEARN, Lafayette, Louisiana, USA

Katy is the functional lead and project manager for the LEaRN project where she oversees the development of partner relationships, research partner projects, and community engagement efforts. Her professional experience spans across industry lines in both the public and private sectors, including economic development, civic engagement, and open-data community improvement projects. Most recently, she worked on projects for the University of Chicago’s “Data Science for Social Good” fellowship which aimed to reduce recidivism rates among mental health populations, reduce the number of new type II diabetes cases in underserved populations, and minimize traffic congestion in Jakarta, Indonesia. She is a Lafayette native with a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in Political Science from University of Louisiana at Lafayette and University of New Orleans respectively. She also holds a certification in “Big Data and Social Analytics” from MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning.

Keith Gremban, Director, Institute for Telecommunication Sciences

Dr. Keith Gremban, who joined NTIA on Monday, May 18, 2015, as Director of ITS and Co-Director of the Center for Advanced Communications, has been involved in systems engineering and advanced technology for over thirty years. His interests are in wireless communications, networking, and networked systems. Before founding Shavano Systems, a systems engineering and program management consulting company, he was a Program Manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), where he managed a portfolio of programs in tactical communications and electronic warfare.

Dr. Gremban worked in industry at SET Corporation, Science Applications International Corporation, SRI International, and Martin Marietta. His industry experience included managing several advanced technology development organizations, and he led projects in tactical command-and-control, networking, robotics, and intelligent systems. Dr. Gremban received his Ph.D. and M.S. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University, and his M.S. in Applied Mathematics and B.S. in Mathematics from Michigan State University.

Natalia Villanueva Rosales, The University of Texas at El Paso, USA

Dr. Villanueva Rosales’ work aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of discovery, integration, and trust of scientific data and models. Her approach links human and machine knowledge to address societally-relevant problems in areas that require interdisciplinary approaches supported by the development and application of data science such as the sustainability of water resources and Smart cities. She is passionate about encouraging and supporting women and Hispanics pursuing a career or education in Science and Engineering. Diversity, inclusion, and collaboration are at the core of her research, teaching and service activities.

She obtained a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carleton University (Canada) with the thesis and also holds an M.Sc. in Artificial Intelligence from the University of Edinburgh (UK). She has a Bachelors’s degree in Computer Science from the “Universidad Panamericana Campus Aguascalientes” and a double-major in Statistics from the Center for Mathematics Research (CIMAT, Mexico).

Nélio Alessandro Azevedo Cacho, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brasil

Nélio works in the areas of Software Engineering and Distributed Systems, with an emphasis on the following topics: Big Data Analytics, Fault Tolerance Mechanisms, Load balancing and Security in Discovery Service Mechanisms, Mobile and Ubiquitous Computing, Cloud Computing and Smart Cities.

He carried out a postdoctoral internship at Newcastle University (UK, 2017-2018), with a PhD in Computer Science at the University of Lancaster (UK, 2005-2008), and a Masters and Bachelor of Computer Science degree at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN, 2004-2006).

He has won the following international awards:

• Google Research Award for Latin America (LARA 2019), Google Inc. (2019 and 2018)
• Best Paper Award in the 5th IEEE International Smart Cities Conference (IEEE ISC2 2019), Paper – Orthus: A Blockchain Platform for Smart Cities, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). (2019)
• Best Paper Award in the IEEE International Conference on Smart City Innovations (San Francisco, EUA), Paper “Feature Engineering for Crime Hotspot Detection”, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE, 2017).
• Best Paper Award in the 3rd IEEE Smart Cities Conference (Wuxi, China), Paper “Towards an Architecture for Smart Garbage Collection in Urban Settings”, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE, 2017).
• ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award in the 36th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2014), Paper “Trading Robustness for Maintainability: an Empirical Study of Evolving C# Program”, ACM SIGSOFT (2014).

Rosaldo J. F. Rossetti, University of Porto, Portugal

Rosaldo Rossetti joined the Faculty of Engineering at University of Porto, Portugal, as assistant professor in 2006, initially in the Informatics Section of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. As of January 2008, however, he moved to the recently created Department of Informatics Engineering. He is also a research fellow at the Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science Lab. (LIACC), within the distributed AI and robotics group, at the same University. Dr. Rossetti received the B.Eng. (Hons) degree in civil engineering from UFC, in 2005, and both the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science from UFRGS, Brazil, in 1998 and 2002, respectively. He carried out most of his doctoral research as a full-time Ph.D. research student at Leeds University’s Institute for Transport Studies, Leeds, UK, within the Network Modelling Group. Dr. Rossetti has been actively engaged as member of technical committees and as co-organiser of many scientific events related to AI, MAS, and ITS, and served as reviewer for journals such as the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INTELLIGENT TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS, Transportation Research Part C, the Journal of the American Society of Civil Engineering, the Transactions of SCS International, and the Journal of Intelligent Transportation Systems: Technology, Planning, and Operations. As of 2013, he is the ITS department editor of IEEE INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS, and has served as associate editor of IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INTELLIGENT TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS since 2011.

He is currently a member of the IEEE ITS Society’s Board of Governors for the term 2011–2013, and a Co-chair of the IEEE ITS Society’s Technical Activities Committee on Artificial Transportation Systems and Simulation. Besides IEEE, he is also an active member of ACM, APPIA, and AISTI. Dr. Rossetti’s main research interests generally include complex systems analysis, systems optimization, computer simulation, AI, and multi-agent systems (MAS). Currently, he is focusing on the application of AI techniques to tackle engineering problems, especially on using MAS-based simulation as a modelling metaphor to address issues in Intelligent Transportation Systems and urban mobility in general. Some of his ongoing projects are related to modelling and architectural issues of Artificial Transportation Systems, activity-based analysis of travel demand using MAS, AI techniques to implement optimised distributed traffic control and management, and simulators interoperability.

Victor M. Larios, Director of the Smart Cities Innovation Center (SCIC), The University of Guadalajara

Victor M. Larios followed higher education degree programs a the ITESO University in Mexico (BSc in Electronics Engineering) and the Université de Technologie de Compiègne in France (MSc and Ph.D.). He is a Full Professor at the Information Systems Department at the University of Guadalajara (UDG). Since April 2014, he is the Director of the Smart Cities Innovation Center (SCIC) and leads a group of researchers in Smart Cities and Information Technologies at UDG. His primary research interests are in Smart Cities, IoT Distributed Systems, Networking, Multiagent Systems, and Data Visualization using Virtual Reality. As contributions, Dr. Larios published more than 70 papers in international refereed journals and conferences and published a book in Serious Games.

Dr. Larios is cooperating in projects with the High Technology industry and government using design thinking and agile methodologies to accelerate technology transfer in living labs. As an entrepreneur, he is the founder and CIO of a consulting company IDI Smart Cities, working in cooperation with Advion Solutions from Finland. The main activities are the market research and the development of coordinated international projects in Latin American Countries and the European Union.  More specifically, efforts are in place to introduce the Circular Economy Model as a sustainability component for the Mega-Cities. As a volunteer, Dr. Larios also is a technical advisor for the Guadalajara Smart City project for the Government and international ONGs as IEEE. Victor M. Larios is a Senior Member at IEEE with 27 years of membership and the local leader of Guadalajara Core City at the IEEE Smart Cities Initiative since 2013.

Xiao-Jun Wu, Institute of Science & Technology, Jiangnan University, Wuxi (China)

Xiao-Jun Wu received his B.S. degree in mathematics from Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, PR China in 1991 and M.S. degree in 1996, and Ph.D. degree in Pattern Recognition and Intelligent System in 2002, both from Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, PR China, respectively. He was a fellow of United Nations University, International Institute for Software Technology (UNU/IIST) from 1999 to 2000. From 1996 to 2006, he taught in the School of Electronics and Information, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology where he was an exceptionally promoted professor. He joined School of Information Engineering (now renamed as School of IoT Engineering), Jiangnan University in 2006 where he is a distinguished professor of level two. He won the most outstanding postgraduate award by Nanjing University of Science and Technology. He has published more than 200 papers in his fields of research, among which 60 papers have indexed by SCI and more than 100 papers have been indexed by EI. He has won different awards including international award, national award and provincial award for his research achievements. He was a visiting postdoctoral researcher in the Centre for Vision, Speech, and Signal Processing (CVSSP), University of Surrey, UK from 2003 to 2004, under the supervision of Professor Josef Kittler. His current research interests are pattern recognition, computer vision, fuzzy systems, neural networks and intelligent systems. He is an associate editor of International Journal of Computer Mathematics , review editor of Frontiers in Neurorobotics, and editor of Journal of Algorithm and Computational Technology respectively. He is in charge of Wuxi IEEE Smart Cities Pioneering Program, IEEE Smart Cities Initiative.

Martin M. Zoltick, Rothwell, Figg, Washington, DC, USA

Martin M. Zoltick is a shareholder with Rothwell, Figg, Ernst & Manbeck, P.C. in Washington, DC. He has been practicing in the field of technology law for more than 30 years.  His practice is focused primarily on IP matters, transactions, and privacy, data protection, and cybersecurity.  Mr. Zoltick is a Certified Information Privacy Professional in the United States (CIPP/US) and works with his clients to help them understand and navigate the rapidly evolving area of privacy and data protection law. He is working with clients to prepare, integrate, and implement best practices for CCPA, other state’s laws, and GDPR compliance. With his technical background and expertise, he is uniquely positioned to work with IT and technical teams to understand potential exposure and minimize the risks of a breach. Mr. Zoltick is currently providing thought leadership on the application of data protection laws and industry/technology-specific data privacy and security considerations for IoT devices, biometric data, and in outer space

Mr. Zoltick is a registered patent attorney, and a substantial part of his practice involves drafting and prosecuting patent applications and, along with that, developing with his clients IP strategic plans designed to maximize value and satisfy both legal and business objectives. Mr. Zoltick also has significant experience handling contested cases and disputes on behalf of his clients. He regularly serves as trial counsel in major patent disputes in the U.S. federal district courts and as lead counsel in post-grant proceedings before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Patent Trial and Appeal Board.

Mr. Zoltick represents a wide range of U.S.-based and international clients, including independent inventors, entrepreneurs, emerging businesses, middle market and mature companies, as well as investors and venture capitalists.

Talk Title: “Hey Siri and Alexa” – How on Earth (or, for that matter, in Outer Space) Can I Determine What Data Protection and Privacy Laws Apply and How to Comply?

Abstract –New laws are taking effect across the globe to regulate the collection, use, and protection of personal information.  At the same time, the rate of cyber attacks, data breaches and unauthorized use of personal data is growing exponentially. The massive proliferation of IoT devices and technology, now expanded even further to include space-based technologies, gives rise to unique and challenging considerations from a legal and regulatory perspective. With the autonomous data collection, transfer, tracking, analysis, and decision-making enabled by IoT and IoS technologies that will no doubt include personal information, it is more important than ever to understand the rights and obligations of individuals and organizations with respect to personal information. The rapidly evolving technology landscape and high profile data breach cases have elevated privacy, data protection, and cybersecurity to a key business risk and operational priority.

In this presentation, I will address the new data protection and privacy laws, rules and regulations that are, or soon will be, in effect, including the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), and other similar regulations being adopted in the US and around the World. I will relate these new laws to several use cases involving IoT devices and the processing of personal information, including location, financial, health, genetic, and biometric data.  I will then address what steps are necessary to develop and implement a compliance strategy and framework for risk management to establish best practices for compliance with the evolving new data protection and privacy laws, and touch on the role of new technologies utilizing, for example, blockchain and AI techniques in mitigating risks and supporting compliance.

Description

Organizations working with Engineered and Manufactured systems have decades of pioneering experience in the design, implementation, and operation of instrumented products.  Aerospace, automotive, maritime, and building systems are often highly laden with sensors that observe real-time performance of these product systems as they operate.  Remote observers may communicate and even control these systems from afar.  Over the lifetime of these systems – airplanes, cars, buildings, and ships – data on the performance across a large set of diverse, released product systems reveals much about the gap between as-designed, as-built, and as-operated actual systems.

Therefore, the IoT trend is not new to our community, yet the scale, reduced latency and cost, heterogeneity, and especially interconnectivity of these systems across economic and social infrastructures has been dramatic. Most significantly, rather than viewing these data sets product by product, we need consider the performance of instrumented products in the interplay amongst many systems and especially with people.  To take advantage of these opportunities, not only must the design of our engineered systems advance, but also how we engineer will be transformed.

In the IEEE World Forum on IoT Industry Track we will discuss recent cases and emerging research on the application of IoT in industry.  We will discuss the transformation of industrial organizations to become aware, explore, and rapidly respond to new data science capabilities.  The important concurrent trend in model-based or digital engineering along with IoT will also be considered.  Finally, we will bring in the discussion of instrumentation of teamwork:  the capability to see and predict in real time the performance of human teams as they work, coordinate, work, make mistakes, adjust and learn (or not.)  Speakers and papers from engineering and manufacturing in aerospace, automotive, maritime, and building infrastructure are welcome.

Track Chair

Bryan Moser Academic Director, System Dynamics & Management, MIT, Cambridge, MA USA

Dr. Bryan Moser is Sr. Lecturer and Academic Director of System Design & Management (SDM) at MIT, and a Project Associate Professor at the University of Tokyo, where he directs the Global Teamwork Lab (GTL.  Prior to returning to MIT in 2014, he worked for 25 years in industry; as a research engineer at the Basic Science Lab (A.I.) of Nissan Motor Company, as a Sr. Research Scientist at United Technologies Corporation, and as founder and President of Global Project Design, a firm pioneering software and methods for model-based project management. Moser focuses on engineering teamwork for complex systems problems and use of model-based methods to improve performance of diverse teams.   Moser received a Bachelor in Computer Science and Engineering in 1987 and a Master of Science in Technology and Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1989. His doctorate in 2012 is from the University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Frontier Sciences.

Track Description

Internet of Things (IoT) is rapidly evolving in healthcare.  Up to 85 percent of health care providers and systems are utilizing IoT. This technology is used to connect MedTech products to healthcare networks and to EHR systems.

Consumerism is driving health, and consumers have adopted a variety of wearable devices and apps that help them monitor their activity, sleep patterns, heart rate, and other metrics. Physicians, hospitals and providers can also monitor patients’ health continuously using wearables and telehealth technology. IoT is used to streamline and bridge the technologies leading to improved patient health outcomes, patient’s safety, patient’s engagement and satisfaction with care. IoT is utilized through all the stages of data collection from these technologies, leading to analytics by leveraging all the collected data in order to better manage health and improve outcomes. Predictive and prescriptive analytics will result in faster diagnosis, better treatment recommendations and overall decrease in medication and treatment errors. IoT is also important to control hospital and healthcare facilities environments including power plants, communication, supply chain, and other operations resulting in improvements in efficiency, decrease in infections, decrease in costs and improvements in patients’ satisfaction and outcomes.

In the world forum IEEE IoT healthcare vertical track, we will be discussing how hospitals, health systems, and health providers are leveraging IoT technologies towards improving patients’ engagements, and outcomes. Case studies of Telehealth technology will be discussed in detail, in addition, case studies of utilizing wearables and other technologies towards improving patient outcomes and satisfaction with care will be discussed.

Track Co-Chairs

Nabil Adamas, New Jersey School of Medicine, USA

Nabil R. Adam is a distinguished professor of computers and information systems; Professor of Medicine, New Jersey School of Medicine; the founding director of the Rutgers of the Institute for Data Science, Learning, and Applications. He served as the Vice Chancellor of research & collaborations with Rutgers University Newark (2014-2018). He was on loan as a fellow of the US Department of Homeland Security Science & Technology Directorate where he served as a senior program manager, a branch chief. He served as a research fellow in the Center of Excellence in Space Data and Information Science, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. He was as a member of the Science Council of the Research Institute for Advanced Computer Science, NASA Ames. His research was supported by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where he contributed to the Protein Data Bank project. His research work has been supported by over $22 million from various federal and state agencies, including DHS; NSF; NSA; EPA; DoD; NASA; NIH; NOAA; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; and the NJ Meadowlands Commission.

Ziad M. Ashkar University of Louisiana at Lafayette, LA USA

Dr Ziad Maurice Ashkar is the Director of the Louisiana Center for Health Innovation (LCHI) at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. LCHI is created to leverage the power of public and private data for the benefit of patients, medical professionals and researchers to improve health outcomes. Dr Ashkar is the current recipient of the Dr.J.Robert Rivet endowed Chair and the Acadian Ambulance Service/BORSF Eminent Scholar Endowed Chair in health informatics.

Before this role, Dr Ashkar was the Chief Medical Officer of Lafayette General Health, and the Section Chief of Medicine at the LSU program at Lafayette. Dr Ashkar is a Nephrologist by training and has been practicing in the Lafayette community for a number of years. Dr Ashkar obtained his medical degree from the American University of Beirut. He also has a doctorate in health systems management/public health from Tulane university, a master’s degree in public health from johns Hopkins university and an MBA from LSU.

Track Speakers

Cian Robinson, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Cian Robinson began his career at Lafayette General Foundation (LGF) in August of 2014 as the Director of Development and Operations. In November of 2014, Cian was promoted to the position of Executive Director of the Foundation, and in 2018 was moved to the position of Executive Director of Innovation, Research and Real Estate Investments for Lafayette General Health System. In addition to his work at LGF, Cian is also an adjunct instructor at the B. I. Moody III College of Business Administration at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

Prior to LGF, Cian was a Director of two computer science based research centers within the University of Louisiana at Lafayette’s Research Department (Center for Business and Information Technology and Center for Visual and Decision Informatics) as well as a decades long entrepreneur in the information technology and management consulting fields (Robinson Ventures, LLC).

In 1991, Cian obtained his Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from Saint Vincent College (Latrobe, PA). In 1994, he was awarded his Master of Science in Public Policy and Administration (finance concentration) from Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz College (Pittsburgh, PA). Cian is currently pursuing his doctorate in Leadership from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. He has been recognized for his entrepreneurial and community work with several awards including: Silicon Bayou 100 (2017, 2018, 2019); Leadership Louisiana (2017), LEAD Virginia (Class of 2008), Amherst N.Y. Chamber of Commerce’s Small Business Champion Award (2006), Western New York’s 40 Under 40 Award (2005), Niagara Frontier Industry Education Council’s Pathfinder Award (2004), National Science Foundation’s Entrepreneur Next Wave Award (2003), as well as Leadership Buffalo’s Class of 2000.

He and his wife Dr. Natalie Harder reside in Lafayette, LA and have two children, Tucker and Rory.

Ravi Teja Bhupatiraju, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA

Dr. Ravi Teja Bhupatiraju is a Research Scientist at the Louisiana Center for Health Innovation (LCHI) at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. LCHI was created to leverage the power of public and private data for the benefit of patients, medical professionals and researchers to improve health outcomes.

Dr. Bhupatiraju received his medical degree from Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India, a doctorate in Biomedical Informatics from Oregon Health and Science University and post-doctoral training from the Lister Hill National Center for Biomedical Communications at the National Library of Medicine at NIH.

Dr. Bhupatiraju worked in the areas of Information Retrieval – NIST’s TREC genomics track and with the medbiquitous consortium, on metadata discovery systems for learning management systems offering continuing medical education. His doctoral work was developing novel cognitive theory from observations of clinicians performing medication safety tasks. His work at NLM focused on Natural Language Processing to help develop drug-drug interaction detection systems for the FDA, simplifying research biomedical named entity recognition tools for non-technical users, predictive analytics with deep learning, graph modeling of the semantic MEDLINE database and tools to explore co-occurrence trends in MeSH indexing terms. At LCHI, he conducts medical data analytics, in part for Louisiana Department of Health and designs mobile tools for stress detection in emergency care clinicians.

Talk Title: Detecting and Analyzing Stress in Nurses with Biometric feedback

Abstract: Clinician burnout is a significant problem in the US healthcare system; over 50% physicians report experiencing burnout and over 80% of nurses report high job strain. Early detection of stress may help prevent burnout by providing an opportunity to address stress early, before it has taken its toll.

The goal of this project is to analyze stress in nurses through biometric feedback in a hospital setting. Using wearable technology, we developed machine learning techniques that collect biometric feedback that can detect stress levels of participants. We gather signals to measure and model with heart rate, skin temperature, galvanic skin response and movement to detect stress, following up with surveys administered through mobile devices to investigate the nature of the stress, allowing us to iteratively refine the detection models. We hope to eventually reduce chronic stress and reduce churn among care providers using these technologies.

Jacob Corbell, Cardiovascular Institute of the South (CIS), USA

Jacob Corbell serves as the Executive Vice President of Business Development for Cardiovascular Institute of the South (CIS).  He brings more than 10 years of health care experience to CIS.  He oversees the CIS Virtual Care Center and Telecardiology programs at CIS, as well as the development of new practices.

Corbell earned both a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Louisiana in Lafayette.

In 2012, Corbell joined CIS as an administrative resident as part of the MBA Health Care Administration Program at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.  Corbell joined CIS full-time in 2015 as an executive project manager and began building the Telecardiology program and other strategic corporate initiatives for the institute.

In 2016, he earned the CIS Shining Star Award and in 2017, the Leadership Award, presented to a team leader demonstrating the spirit of teamwork, creativity, innovation, and willingness to meet the challenges of the future. Corbell is a member of the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE) and the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA).

JP Pollak, Weill Cornell Medicine, USA

Dr Pollak is a co-founder of The Commons Project, Senior Researcher in Residence at Cornell Tech, and Assistant Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at Weill Cornell Medicine. His primary interest is helping patients, clinicians, and researchers collect health-related data needed for research, treatment, and intervention. He is currently leading a group of academic and industry partners in building Common Health, the Android equivalent to Apple Health, meant to help people download, store, and share data from their clinical record. He has designed mobile health applications in domains such as diet and exercise, cancer, and chronic pain. He also developed the Photographic Affect Meter (PAM), a digital assessment of emotional state that is used widely in clinical and behavioral research and industry. In industry and as an entrepreneur, he has developed several leading applications in health and life sciences, broadly ranging from genetics to population modeling to health behavior, including the award winning Wellcoin app. Pollak earned a Master’s in Human-Computer Interaction and a PhD in Information Science at Cornell University.

Talk Title: The Mobile Phone is the New Central Organizing Point for Health Data

Abstract: As the line blurs between which data are considered important for health and not, the mobile phone will play an increasingly important role in collecting, storing, organizing, and sharing health data. Patient-generated data collected on mobile devices, ranging from IoT data to patient-reported outcomes, are now considered crucial endpoints in clinical research and are gradually finding their way into clinical workflows. Electronic Medical Record data, long confined to clinical systems, is now accessible to nearly any person with a smartphone. Accordingly, we are building new tools, standards, and policies to better make use of these data across the complex healthcare ecosystem. In this time of changing conceptions around data use and rights, it is critically important that individual autonomy and privacy are given top priority.

Aimee Quirk, Innovation at Ochsner Health, USA

Aimee Quirk is the CEO of innovationOchsner (iO), an innovation company founded by Ochsner Health System in 2015 to reimagine and revolutionize the delivery and experience of healthcare and health, with a focus on digital health, advanced analytics and personalized medicine.  iO has developed several award-winning programs, including Ochsner Digital Medicine, Connected MOM , Optimal Hospital, and has launched several innovative partnerships and tools including multiple AI predictive models for clinical and operations applications and population genomics.

Aimee joined iO in 2015 with more than 15 years of experience in law, economic development and public affairs. Previously, she served as the Senior Advisor for Economic Development for New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu from 2010 to 2014.  Prior to her public service, she was a partner at Jones Walker, where she practiced corporate and business litigation. Aimee received a B.S. in Finance magna cum laude from Louisiana State University and a J.D. summa cum laude from Tulane University School of Law. She has been recognized by Becker’s among the Women to Watch in Health IT and participates in multiple healthcare innovation advisory boards and networks. A native of New Orleans, she serves on several community boards, including GNO, Inc., the Association for Corporate Growth and the Center for Resilience.

Jared Quoyeser, Partner Solution Sales – National Solution Providers, Intel Corporation

Jared S. Quoyeser is currently the US Director, National Solution Providers at Intel Corporation leading transformation across Intel’s partner ecosystem. Prior to his current role, Jared served as Director,Americas Vertical Segments for Intel Americas, where he led vertical segment business strategy,strategic marketing and revenue attainment teams for State and Local -Education, Federal,Healthcare/Life Sciences, Financial Services, Energy and Retail Verticals. Jared has also held business and market development positions at Intel, including worldwide wireless market development and strategic business development for the cellular handheld division. Prior to joining Intel, Jared served in various management and business development roles for Sutter Health, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Columbia/HCA and Physician Corporation of America. Jared holds a Masters of Healthcare Administration and Business Administration from the University of Houston and Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Louisiana.

Michael Dozier, Clinical Integration, Lafayette, Louisiana, USA

Mr. Dozier has been a part of Lafayette General Health (LGH) since 2014 as the Chief Information Officer. Under Dozier’s leadership, Lafayette General has become a leader in technology across the state of Louisiana and has brought LGH numerous innovative strategies and organizational alignment around IT. Dozier has also lead LGH to be a best places to work in Computer World and Healthcare IT News publications and CHIME Most Wired for Hospitals and Ambulatory. In 2017, Mr. Dozier was tasked with leading LGH Clinical Integration strategies related to value based care delivery and direct to employer strategies.

Mr. Dozier began his healthcare IT career in 2001 where he served in various roles in IT for Porter Health System in Valparaiso, IN. From 2008-2011, he served as the Director of IT/Infrastructure for Valley Health System in Hemet, CA, the Director of I.S. at St. Tammany Parish Hospital, Covington, LA. from 2011-2012, and the Chief Information Officer at Southeast Health, Cape Girardeau, MO. from 2011-2014.

Dozier earned a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Purdue University in 2005 and a Master’s in Business Administration from Indiana Wesleyan University in 2007. He is also a member of College of Healthcare Information Management Executives, HIMSS, and the Louisiana Hospital Association.

Ahmed Gomaa, University of Scranton, Pennsylvania, USA

Ahmed Gomaa is an Associate Professor of Operations and Information Management at the University of Scranton. His research interest is toward using information systems in different domains to theoretically and practically solve existing data management problems. His publications are in the areas of health informatics, business analytics, blockchain, sentiment analysis, and security. Ahmed’s work is cited in granted patents to companies including IBM, British Telecom, Deloitte, Intel, Microsoft, and SAP, to name a few.  Prior to joining Academia, He founded iMediaStreams, a technology company using sentiment analysis for online marketing. As a Forty under 40 NJ Business Journal Award winner, he works closely with the industry. He currently serves as the Director of the Entrepreneurship Program at the University of Scranton. Ahmed earned his MBA and Ph.D. from Rutgers University, NJ. He earned his M.Sc and B.Sc from Alexandria University, Egypt.

Talk Title: Transforming Data Access, Structure, Security, and applications

Abstract: Wearable devices data capture and analysis software systems enable fast turn around for consumer and clinical claims studies and facilitate exploratory research. Due to the ability to capture and analyze data almost in real-time, it is possible to formulate new products and conduct exploratory sensory studies that aids in overall product development. Security and privacy of the data captured is the basic requirement of such systems. We focus on two related challenges.  The first challenge on the hardware level is having secure HIPPA, and GDPR compliant data collection systems, given the inherited volatility of wearable devices to Denial of Service attacks. The second is on the software level and is related to enabling secure payment to panelists and study participants. Those systems of recruitment, data collection and payment usually run independently within different information silos. Our work employs blockchain to address both challenges. Specifically, for hardware authentication, our blockchain solution implements the Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS) IP IoT security handshake model which overcomes the IoT limited resources. On the software level, our blockchain solution addresses the information silo problem.

Description

The societies in the 21st century have been facing compelling problems related to Environment and Ecology. The scientific and engineering communities have been working on understanding the complex nature of ecological systems interacting with the environment and societies as well as developing innovative solutions for compelling problems.

WF-IoT 2020 is an open forum, which accommodates a broad range of end-users, academics, industry and the public sector to lay out the role of IoT in understanding ecological systems and environmental problems and to delve into potential implementations of the connected systems provided by the IoT in the area of environment and ecology.

IoT has been leveraging the development of green supply chain models, smart buildings and cities with reduced solid and water waste. In an effort to reduce and control pollution, IoT plays a critical role in process optimization, design and operation of energy-efficient production systems with reduced CO2 emissions.   IoT provides experts dealing with monitoring the environmental processes operating in inaccessible, polluted or uninhabitable spaces workplace safety. The emerging need for effective management of food, energy, and water (FEW) nexus calls for increased use of IoT in FEW systems. Smart farming systems have a tremendous positive impact on the environment by optimum use of fertilizers, irrigation and plant protection substances in precision farming, which work with connected sensors, weather data, and images from drones or satellites. Such connected systems also enhance food security by improved crop yield and traceability of the food.

The need for the energy transition in tackling the climate change is a complex sociotechnical process, which has various impacts on the environment and the ecology. The process of energy transition and its interaction with the environment and ecology requires monitoring system performances and their impacts on FEW nexus as well as ecological phenomena, biodiversity, wildlife conservation, habitat resilience. The deployment of IoT in this process is inevitable and will open doors to the innovative use of it.

IoT has great potential to bring about insight into the interaction of environment and ecology with sociotechnical systems emerging in the 4^th industrial revolution. This track will provide a suite of presentations from end-users, industry, and academia on their cutting-edge work. Each session will also include a panel discussion to enable full participation between the audience and our invited experts.

Track Chair

Sebnem Duzgun, Colorado School of Mines, Golden CO, USA

Sebnem  Düzgün is Professor and Fred Banfield Distinguished Endowed Chair in the Mining Engineering Department at Colorado School of Mines. She also has a joint appointment in the Department of Computer Science at Mines. She received her Ph.D. degree in 2000 from the Department of Mining Engineering at Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey. She performed research in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at MIT from 1998 to 1999 with an award given by the Turkish Scientific and Technical Council (TUBITAK). She was appointed as an assistant professor in the Geodetic and Geographic Information Technologies Program at METU in 2001. She performed research as a postdoctoral fellow from 2004 to 2005 at Norwegian Geotechnical Institute and International Center for Geohazards with a grant from the Norwegian Research Council. She then returned to the Department of Mining Engineering at METU in 2006 as an associate professor and became a full professor there in 2010. Dr. Düzgün was awarded the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation’s experienced researcher fellowship in 2014 and used it to research at the Geophysical Institute at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany from 2015 to 2016. She has been over 20 years of experience in research and teaching in earth resources sciences and engineering. Her main areas of research includes quantitative sustainability assessment for extractive industries, quantitative risk assessment for mining hazards and geohazards, critical infrastructure resilience, earth observation in geosciences, information visualization, virtual/augmented/mixed reality (VR/AR/MR) and serious gaming for technical training and collaborative decision making, information technologies for mining systems, spatial and Spatio-temporal data mining, big data analytics and AI. She is on the Editorial Board of various scientific journals, namely Landslides, Journal of Sustainable Mining; Computers and Geosciences; International Journal of Emergency Management; Georisk Journal; Energy Exploration & Exploitation; and The Open Construction and Building Technology Journal. She was the founder and former CEO of the software company, Kuzgun Informatics, in Turkey, contributor of the three ceramic art exhibitions, the drummer of a local band, and is the mother of two sons.

Track Description

The digitization and automation of a wide swath of business processes and the industrial infrastructure is creating a disruptive change for the energy, power and oil & gas sector. This is affecting production processes, service processes, environmental processes, facilities management, and transportation and logistics systems in a profound manner. The digitization and automation are being driven largely by Internet of Things (IoT) technologies. Sometimes also referred to as the Internet of Things, Services & People (IoTSP).

The deployment of low cost yet powerful sensing and actuation, communication and computing resources combined with the wide availability of data-driven services are the key enablers.

When the utility industry adopts IoT, it is creating new opportunities to manage the grid and connect with the consumer. Suddenly there is an influx of data streaming into the utility that they can harness to make decisions. For example, companies can utilize home automation to monitor consumer use, then adjust access as necessary. They can gather information on how to deliver services, manage infrastructure, and continue to meet consumer needs. Simply, the investment in a smart grid, smart meters, and home automation can allow utility companies to comprehensively recapture the energy industry, drive top-line growth, and improve consumer perception.

The impact of data-derived insights and digital technologies is especially strong within the full oil and gas value chain — upstream, midstream, downstream, services and capital projects. A granular view of network connected assets when linked with data-driven business systems helps generate quicker and better insights to drive competitive performance. The technology is creating opportunities for greater efficiencies and enhanced safety and creating agile organizations that can keep up with all manners of external changes.

This vertical track will feature invited speakers who are thought leaders and leading practitioners in the IoT space and who will report on work that is transforming the energy, power and oil & gas sectors of the global economy. Topics that will be addressed include

• The Internet of Things and the digital twin
• Large scale deployment of connected sensors
• Edge and mobile cloud computing in industrial IoT
• Dependable networks for automation systems
• Industrial IoT Cybersecurity
• Robust and Reliable IoT
• Lessons learned from deployment of IoT technologies

Track Chair

Harshavardhan “Harsh” Karandikar,  ABB Inc., USA

Dr. Harsh Karandikar is an accomplished technology leader with over thirty years of experience in the engineering and product management of industrial products and services and with a focus over the last decade on technologies for medium voltage electrical power distribution. He has a track record of innovation and extensive international experience with strong background in technology strategy development, operation of global engineering organizations, management of complex product development projects, technology transfer, technical consulting and business development. Harsh has co-authored numerous technical papers and is a holder of several patents. Harsh is currently the Global Product Manager for ANSI Medium Voltage Switchgear and for ANSI Switchgear Digital Initiatives for ABB. He is a Senior Member of IEEE and a Fellow of the ASME. He holds a PhD from the University of Houston.

Track Speakers

Benton Calhoun, Co-founder and CO-CTO, Everactive 

Ben Calhoun received his M.S. degree and Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, in 2002 and 2006, respectively. In January 2006, he joined the faculty at the University of Virginia in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, where he is now a Professor. His research emphasizes energy efficient and sub-threshold integrated circuit design for self-powered, batteryless wireless sensing systems. Dr. Calhoun has over 200 peer reviewed publications and 22 issued US patents. He co-founded and is co-CTO at Everactive, Inc., which is selling self-powered, energy harvesting wireless sensing solutions in the industrial IoT market. He is a senior member of the IEEE.

Talk Title: Batteryless Wireless Sensors Unlock a New Digital Data Age

Abstract: Everactive is deploying dense networks of self-powered wireless sensors that generate vast new data streams from previously un-monitored physical assets. Breakthroughs in lowering power consumption, energy harvesting, and RF networks enable solutions that can continuously collect data at an unprecedented scale — all without the maintenance headaches of batteries. This talk covers the technology and applications of batteryless sensing and discusses opportunities for its use in the energy, power, and oil & gas industries. Everactive’s self-powered solutions eliminate costly physical inspection of assets, providing real-time insight and predictive analysis through a cloud platform and online dashboard. By deploying self-powered wireless sensors across your operation, you can sustainably maximize the returns on condition monitoring across your entire facility without adding any new maintenance tasks.

David Lawrence, Manager – Emerging Technology Office, Duke Energy

Steve Beamer, VP Customer Success & Transformation, ElementAnalytics 

Rajit Gadh, Director of Smart Grid Energy Research Center (SMERC), UCLA

Glen Endress, Manager – Emerging Digital Technology, ConocoPhillips

Oluwatobi Oyinlola, Entrepreneur & Consultant, (Rwanda, Africa)

Dr. Rajit Gadh is a Professor at the Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science at UCLA, and the Founding Director of the UCLA Smart Grid Energy Research Center (SMERC). He is also Founder and Director of the Wireless Internet for Mobile Enterprise Consortium (WINMEC). Dr. Gadh’s research interests include Smart Grid, Micro Grids, Electric Vehicle to Grid Integration, Electric Vehicle (EV) and Autonomous Vehicles (AV), Smart Transportation, AI and machine learning in EV and AV management. He has over 200 papers in journals, conferences and technical magazines, and, 5 patents granted. He has a Doctorate degree from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). He has taught as a visiting researcher at UC Berkeley, has been an Assistant, Associate and Full Professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison, and did his sabbatical as a visiting researcher at Stanford University for a year. He has won several awards from NSF (CAREER award, Research Initiation Award, NSF-Lucent Industry Ecology Award, GOAL-I award), SAE (Ralph Teetor award), IEEE (second best student-paper, WTS), ASME (Kodak Best Technical Paper award), AT&T (Industrial ecology fellow award), Engineering Education Foundation (Research Initiation Award), William Wong Fellowship award from University of Hong-Kong, etc., and other accolades in his career. He is on the Editorial board of ACM Computers in Entertainment Publication and the CAD Journal.

Havard Devold, Manager – Digital Technologies for Oil & Gas, ABB Norway

Karthik Gopalakrishnan, Country Head IoT and Connected Solutions, North America, Bosch USA

Karthik is passionate about all things connected and the possibility the future holds for better everyday life in the connected world. He Heads the IoT & Connected solutions business for North America at Robert Bosch based out of Farmington Hills, Michigan.He is a true believer of the Bosch vision to apply the Sensor – Software – Services approach to domains such as Manufacturing ( I4.0) , Mobility, Cities, Communities & Energy to provide sustainable solutions for the industry challenges. He leads IoT solutions Go-To-Market for North America, building partner ecosystems and creating new personas of participants in the IoT value chain. Karthik is a technology & business enthusiast with a vision to build a tech-agnostic, disruptive ecosystem to enable new ideas and its owners to succeed. Prior to Bosch, Karthik has been an Entrepreneur and has worked at Technology companies in Asia & Americas. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering & an MBA from India.

Igor Shirokov, Sevastopol State University

Prof. Igor Shirokov is been a Full Professor at Sevastopol State University, Sevastopol, Russia. He received M.S. (Diploma) and Ph.D. (Candidate of Science) in “Radio Engineering” in Sevastopol Instrument Making Institute, Sevastopol, USSR, in 1981 and 1984, respectively. He received Dr. Sc. (Doctor of Science) in “Radio Engineering” in 2014. His scientific interests are in following fields: antennas and microwave propagation; searching people under avalanches, rock obstruction in mines; telecommunication systems; navigation systems; radar systems; RFID; remote sensing; controlling of technological processes; technological equipment sensors; ultrasonic technology; energy saving technologies; wireless energy transfer. He has more than 580 scientific and methodical publications, including more than 100 Patents and Patent applications.

Rami Zewail, R&D Consultant and Co-Founder, Smart Empower Innovation Labs Inc.

Rami Zewail received a BSc. and MSc. In Electronics & Communications Engineering, Arab Academy for Science and Technology, Egypt, in 2002 and 2004 respectively. And a PhD degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Canada, in 2010. He has over 15 years of academic and industrial R&D experience in areas of embedded computing, machine learning, and signal processing. Dr Zewail’s research experience spans different fields such as Energy industry, Computer vision, biomedical, BlockChain, and IoT. Dr. Zewail has over 12 years of R&D experience in Oil &Gas sector. He has contributed to the scientific community with a patent and over 20 publications.

Dr. Zewail is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Association of Professional Engineers & Geoscientists (APEGA), The Canadian Association for Artificial Intelligence. He also has served as a reviewer for the Journal of Electronics Imaging, Journal of Optical Engineering for the SPIE society.

Talk Title: Accelerating Digital Transformation in Energy Industry Through Edge Computing and Decentralized Intelligence

Abstract: With the emergence of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and low power efficient processors, Embedded Machine learning and edge computing have recently received much interest over a wide range of fields including predictive maintenance, tele-medicine, and wearables. Big players like Google and Microsoft are now moving from Cloud-based intelligence to Embedded Edge-based intelligence.  Edge computing refers to processing, analyzing and storing data at the origin hardware layer instead of the Cloud. Lately, Edge computing has drawn a lot of attention as a key infrastructure and the backbone in IIoT and Industry 4.0 initiatives. Edge Computing is about de-centralization of computing power and intelligence. This has potential to overcome a lot of the current challenges in BIG DATA and Cloud Computing. Examples of foreseen benefits include reduction of decision latency, enabling real-time intelligence, improved operational efficiency, and robustness of connected applications. On the other side, it is well known that the oil and gas industry has traditionally been slow in adopting new technologies and innovation. However, due to the current challenges in the industry, a lot of the companies are now turning towards digital transformation technologies as a means to optimize operations, and maximize financial gains.

Description

Agricultural technologies are used across the entire agri-food supply chain – from the planting of seeds to the harvesting of crops, breeding livestock and treating disease, transporting goods and managing commercial sales, where agricultural innovations have a role to play at every stage. Agricultural science and technology is rapidly becoming one of the world’s fastest growing and exciting markets. It is driven by global changes: a rising population, rapid development of emerging economies with western lifestyle aspirations and growing geopolitical instability around shortages of land, water and energy. A technology revolution is also taking place. Breakthroughs in nutrition, genetics, informatics, satellite imaging, remote sensing, meteorology, precision farming and low impact agriculture mean agricultural technologies have huge potential for development. Also, the scale of farming worldwide has changed significantly in recent years, with a move towards larger, intensive, profit-driven enterprises due to market pressures. This has resulted in demand for cost and labor reducing advanced farm automation technologies which can increase farm productivity. This step change has resulted in a demand for technologies and equipment which can reduce costs and labor inputs with concurrent increases in capacity to provide economies of scale. These economies of scale however will not yield profit unless quality is maintained and this is a central focus of any new technologies developed for the sector. The WF will explore how Internet of Things technologies contribute to address all of these challenges through improvements in yield and efficiency with discussions from renowned experts in academia, industry, and the public sector.

Our meeting location of New Orleans, Louisiana is representative of the diversity in agriculture, with soybeans, cattle, aquaculture, feed grains, horses, sugar cane, poultry, rice and fisheries making up the top ten largest commodities. The state is home to 28 thousand farms spread over 8 million acres with a $3.8 billion annual economic impact. Regional speakers will highlight technology advancements important to the area.

Track Co-Chairs

Mehmet Can Vuran, University of Nebraska – Lincoln, NE USA

Mehmet Can (Jon) Vuran received his B.Sc. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey in 2002. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology in 2004 and 2007, respectively.

Currently, he is the Susan J. Rosowski Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Dr. Vuran received an NSF CAREER award in 2010 for “Bringing Wireless Sensor Networks Underground”. In 2014, 2015, and 2016, he was named a highly-cited researcher in computer science by Thomson Reuters. He received a Parents Recognition Award from UNL Parent’s Association in 2016. He is the co-author of Wireless Sensor Networks textbook, TPC Co-Chair of IEEE INFOCOM 2020, and an editor in Computer Networks Journal, IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing, and IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials Journal. His current research interests include Internet of Things, underground communications, cognitive radio networks, and cyber-physical networks.

Tom Penning, CEO, Irrometer Company, Inc. Riverside, CA USA

Tom Penning is the CEO of Irrometer Co., Inc., a USA based manufacturer and global supplier of soil moisture measurement equipment, primarily used in irrigated agriculture. During 30 years of experience in the irrigation industry, he has worked in both the manufacturing and supply chain segments of the business. Irrometer has developed and deployed numerous automated telemetry systems to gather field soil moisture data for farmers. Irrometer’s sensors are also used by many original equipment manufacturers in their data collection and control systems. Since its inception, Tom has been on the ASABE (American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineering) and AgGateway committees for agricultural data standards development, an effort to streamline integration and adoption of IoT technology in agriculture.