Libelium has just launched a new line of services in order to offer customizable sensor boards for the Waspmote platform. The idea is developers have their own sensor board with just the sensors needed for the specific application they are developing. A list of more than 50 combinable options includes all the sensors previously integrated in the Gas, Events and Agriculture sensor boards (CO ,CO2, O2, soil moisture, luminosity…) what makes possible an incredible number of combinations.

Along with the First International Training Course Libelium opens its wireless sensor networks services line in order to make it easier for companies who want to get their own sensor solution for an specific vertical market.

More info here

What is the connection between cranberry farming, sensor technology, and computer networks? That is the question I posed to Michael Lange, president of Lange Installations in British Columbia. I now know more than I ever thought I would about how those flavorful little berries grow. It is quite a story, and it revolves around cold and moisture, two phenomena that Canadians in general, and cranberry growers specifically, know a lot about.

This is where the technology comes in. When growers protect cranberries against frost, they need to know the exact bog temperature on the canopy. Traditionally they used sensors, hardwired from the bogs to a pump station to transmit environmental information. But, broken cables often disrupt transmissions. Hard wired sensor connections are also challenging because of long distances between the sensors to the pump station. Lange knew there had to be a better way. He found it with Spinwave Systems.

More info here.

From ReadWriteWeb:

The Internet of Things is what happens when you take everyday ordinary objects and put Internet-connected microchips inside them. These microchips help you not only keep track of your belongings, but many of these devices sense their surroundings and report it to other machines as well as to you when you most need it.

From RFID to the Nabaztag Bunny to Arduino hobbyists, innovation is growing at a rapid rate. Our collection features popular videos about how to make your own objects, as well as overviews, interviews and lectures. The intent of these devices is to make our lives easier, yet as David Orban suggests in the eighth video, this is not guaranteed. Issues of data-overload and a lack of privacy may interfere with how these devices ultimately help us. As the growth of this trend continues you’ll be seeing many more videos about the Internet of Things.

More info here.

Surfing and science are something of an odd mix, but we’ve seen time and time again that the two subjects to together like, well, salt and water. The latest high-tech stick to hit that briney mix comes from a team at UC San Diego, who outfitted a board with eight sensors on the bottom that measure the speed of the water as it rushes beneath. All are controlled by a waterpoofed computer embedded in the nose, which transmits data wirelessly to an Eee PC left sadly on the beach while its partner splashes around in the waves. The goal is to attempt to determine what level of flex is optimal and, once determined, to create the ultimate board and rule the world… the surfing world, at least.

More info here.

One of the emerging trends of 2010 has been the Internet of Things, a term for when real-world objects get connected to the Internet. One of the key aspects of this trend is the data explosion that will occur when millions of objects send data to the cloud – mostly via very small sensors. Just as the ‘web 2.0′ era led to platforms for user-generated and ’social’ content (think Facebook, Twitter, Google’s OpenSocial), the Internet of Things era will lead to platforms for sensor data.

It’s still very early in this era and the platforms we’ll profile here are at this point more about experimentation than commercialization.

More info here.

Due to the progressive development of urban areas and infrastructure, more and more people settle in environments that are or become endangered by mass movements. This situation is being complicated by the fact that the dependency of our society on a functioning infrastructure and number of human or objects in endangered areas increases at the same time. Early warning and alarm systems are an efficient tool to face landslide hazard and reduce the risk landslides, especially where no other mitigation strategies are suitable. Currently existing monitoring systems for early warning are available in terms of monolithic systems. This is a very cost-intensive way considering installation as well as operational and personal expenses. This displays the demand for modern cost-efficient technologies to upgrade existing and to develop new systems.

The main purpose of the SLEWS project is the development of a prototypic real-time landslide monitoring and early warning system for an efficient landslide hazard management. In this context especially the enhancement of data quality to improve recognition and analysis of hazardous situations and reduction of false alarm rates are of special interest. The whole information chain from data gathering, validation and interpretation to data retrieval, visualization and user specific warning is subject of the research project. The project focuses on innovative web technologies using standards according to the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) sensor web enablement (OGC SWE) and cost efficient but reliable micro sensors (MEMS) from the automotive industry. The integration of heterogeneous data and information from various providers may be established by an open platform strategy using the web service technology. The Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) integrates modern sensor technologies, data gathering, storage and retrieval as well as services for data validation, processing and alarm generation.

More Info here.

Wiring large building for fire safety systems, climate control mechanisms, and other public safety monitoring schemes consumes a lot of wire — imagine how much feet of copper connects every room, corridor, stairwell and broom closet in a building like the Empire State. So researchers figured out a far more simplified scheme for creating wireless sensor networks within buildings — why not use the heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) ducts that are already connecting the entire building as a big antenna that relays data via radio frequency identification (RFID)?

The scheme is rather simple but it could amount to huge cost savings for builders, as it saves the materials and time needed to physically connect sensors within a structure. Take the climate control system for instance. In order to function properly, temperature sensors have to be wired throughout the building to tell the central heating and cooling unit when and where to pipe conditioned air.

More info here.

Early prototyping has proven to be an essential methodology to evaluate wireless sensing systems. Furthermore, it offers an excellent way to assess the applicability of the technology against real user requirements and to promote its market adoption. Building on the last two years’ successful events, the Wireless Sensing Interest subGroup (WiSIG) of the Electronics, Sensors, Photonics Knowledge Transfer Network (ESP KTN) is organising a Demonstrator Showcase to provide an opportunity for industry and academia to display technology, platforms, and realistic applications of wireless sensing. The purpose of the event is to raise awareness of the current state of the art and encourage future collaborations among the exhibitors and attendees.

The Wireless Sensing Demonstrator Showcase invites innovative demonstrations from industry and academia. Demos will be classified into two categories R&D systems and Commercial Products. The event will be hosted by the Sensing Technology 2010 Exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham UK on Tuesday 28th September

Both wireless sensing systems developed as ‘instruments to enable scientific investigation’ and also ‘as solutions to known problems’. Demonstrators need to be end-to-end systems with achievements beyond the state of the art at one or more of the following levels: physical level, sensing level, energy harvesting, power management, data fusion, middleware, communications, information extraction, and user interfaces.

They are particularly encouraging demonstrators in the areas of body sensor networks, environmental monitoring, industrial monitoring and control, security and surveillance as well as assisted living. The demo proposals will be reviewed by a committee and the delegates of the Sensing Technology 2010 Exhibition. The ‘Best Demo Award’ will be awarded in each of the two categories based upon both the technical and innovation contribution.

IMPORTANT DATES
Submission deadline:     Sept 1, 2010
Acceptance notification:   Sept 10, 2010
Camera-ready deadline:  Sept 20, 2010
Demo Registration deadline: Sept 15, 2010
Showcase date:              Sept 28, 2010

Registration and more info here

The device that Mehdi Kalantari hopes will revolutionize monitoring of the structural integrity of bridges around the world is about as small and flat as a credit card and is powered by the sun, by ambient light or even by stray radio waves it can pick out of the atmosphere.

An Iranian immigrant and electrical engineer at the University of Maryland, College Park, Kalantari has devised what he calls a lightweight, low-power, wireless sensor that he hopes will detect weaknesses in bridges and other infrastructure before they can turn into calamities such as the collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge that killed 13 people in Minneapolis in 2007.

If they work as imagined, the devices would detect anomalies in the structure of even the most inaccessible parts of bridges and send alerts via cellular frequencies to its human masters. Among the things it would measure would be stress loads, vibration, temperature and the creation and growth of cracks.

More info here.

The report entitled “IoT Conference Report 2010” is now online and downloadable. It was written by Rob van Kranenburg of Council, Knowledge Partner. Here are the provisional conclusions:

On a technological level we see a tendency towards many platforms, a high number of solutions and open standards and we foresee a deluge of data. Much like the end of the 90’s when RFID got under the penny cost and database storage became cheaper and cheaper, storage as such might not be the real issue, but turning data into meaningful information for end users remains the key challenge. Especially when we are confronted with a tendency to making data public by governments and by public making data through all kinds of emerging services like Pachube, Arrayent and AlertMe. Is it possible to build a generic service layer between end users and the applications, appliances and devices in the home, work and fun sphere? Confronted with younger generations that want to stage their lives and are accustomed to sharing so they might want to ‘stage’ their homes by tweeting every change, new notions of privacy and privacies become crucial if we want to balance a productive and innovative relationship between individuals and groups.

More info here.