Fraunhofer IESE presents BelAmI at CeBIT 2006
In the context of the Ambient Intelligence research program of the University of Kaiserslautern and in cooperation with the Bay Zoltan Foundation and the Technical University of Budapest in Hungary, Fraunhofer IESE is currently developing assistance systems for elderly people to make their daily lives easier. An initial prototype will be available in May 2006.
Specifically, scientists are working on establishing an “Assisted Living” laboratory, an apartment-like environment for testing various computer-controlled systems that will support different daily life scenarios. The lab will be built at the Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering IESE in Kaiserslautern and will initially serve to perform basic research on the technologies for tracking daily routines. The German-Hungarian collaboration project, with a total volume of 6.3 million euro, is being co-funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, and the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, and is scheduled to run for four years.
The focus of the research performed at Fraunhofer IESE is the detection of emergencies with suitable sensors. Intelligent “Assisted Living“ systems use conspicuous patterns of behavior to infer that a critical situation exists, and then either call for help or intervene on their own. They actively support daily routines and ensure that a structured daily routine is adhered to while keeping in the background.
Researchers at Fraunhofer IESE assume that the demand for intelligent systems for the support of elderly, sick, or handicapped people will experience strong growth in the future. There are not only financial reasons for this, although given the demographic changes, significant expenses will be incurred for emergency services, intensive care medicine, inpatient care, or nursing care. It is very understandable that many people want to remain in their familiar living environment even when they get older, or that they prefer recuperating at home rather than in a hospital. "Modern assisted living systems enable people with a handicap to maintain a self-determined, independent daily routine“, says Thomas Kleinberger, project manager at Fraunhofer IESE. “This increases their quality of life and gives them self-confidence – which are some of the best things that we can achieve with modern computer technology."