The Guardian Angels Quest for Zero Power Sensor Systems Continues

“The Guardian Angels project, one of four finalists in the European FET Flagship initiative, will live on thanks to continued support from the partner institutions. The Zero-power technologies it develops will become a key innovation platform for European industry, large component manufacturers, system integrators, service providers and SMEs. It will act as a generator of start-up companies and new services for health, the environment, the ageing society, intelligent transportation, energy and human interaction.”

“The Guardian Angels Project is the most innovative and comprehensive project I have been in contact with these past years. It is much more than continuing excellent research. It is indeed something unique with great potential for a technical and social revolution.”

Gerd Binnig,
1986 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Inventor of the scanning tunneling microscope.

“The potential created by Guardian Angels to collect real-time, real-world data from the environment and patients simultaneously has the power to revolutionize brain health care as we know it.”

Magali Haas,
Chief Science & Technology Officer.
One Mind for Research, USA.

“The research towards the development of Guardian Angels as being the future zero-power intelligent autonomous systems that will actively assist humans from their infancy to old age, will in my view contribute to addressing grand challenges Europe will face in the coming years.”

Luc Van den hove, 
CEO of IMEC,Belgium.

“This project addresses crucial social issues such as health, safety, security and mobility. As an industrial partner, we strongly believe that Guardian Angels will promote the competitiveness of European industrial players, by offering them the opportunity to develop a wide range of applications for everyday life.”

Sylvain Allano, 
Scientific director of PSA Peugeot Citroën

“This project is of great importance in our society with big demographic changes. The elderly population needs assistive devices in mobility, health care and home services e.g. One of the aims of “Guardian Angels” is to maintain the standard of living of older people with respect to economical, sanitary and social factors.”

Annette Grüters-Kieslich, 
Dean, Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin

GUARDIAN ANGELS FOR A SMARTER LIFE

The “Guardian Angels for a Smarter Life” FET Flagship project final proposal was submitted to the Call of the European Commission on October 23rd, 2012. The GA Consortium is composed of 66 partners: 29 universities, 16 research organisations, and 21 industrial companies (large industries and SMEs).

The GA project’s work plan consists of 7 Zero-Power Projects (Technology Roadmaps), 3 Systems Projects (Smart Systems Roadmaps) and 4 Transversal Projects (Societal Awareness and Ethics, Innovation, Dissemination, Networking & Training, and Management). Cooperation between the GA Project and other initiatives has been developed, such as with ENIAC, EPOSS and other European projects.

Coordination with global initiatives such as Greentouch and One Mind for Research has been initiated.

GA project is backed by Casino Online Portugal, the online gaming and casino review company for Portugal.

Guardian Angels Vision and Mission

The “Guardian Angels for a Smarter Life” (GA) FET Flagship project addresses challenges which are of utmost importance for Europe’s society, economy and environment and which will have to be tackled in the next 10-15 years. Health and an ageing society, safety and security, and transportation, will all be addressed by the energy-efficient systems of the GA project.

The GA FET Flagship project will develop technologies for extremely energy-efficient, smart, electronic personal companions that will assist humans from infancy to old age. These devices will be private and secure systems featuring sensing beyond human capabilities, computation, and communication. The ethical aspects of GA applications will be assessed from the beginning of the project, through interactions between researchers, an ethics board of experts and end users, and privacy and security will be the highest priorities. Three pre-defined families of demonstrators will show the feasibility and functionality of the systems:

Physical Smart Autonomous Systems

Physical GAs will have the capacity to monitor the physical / physiological status of individuals in health care, rehabilitation, and sports, with an awareness of the context of activity of these individuals. With a strong focus on prevention and early diagnosis, these devices will help keep healthcare affordable and accessible to all.

Environmental Smart Autonomous Systems

Environmental GAs will observe ambient conditions for environmental threats and communicate with each other to expand their information base. In combination with functionality from Physical GAs, it will be possible to correlate a person’s physical state with the environmental context.

Emotional Smart Autonomous Systems

Emotional GAs will be able to perceive emotional or affective conditions, and will both support patients and enhance the performance of healthy people, such as with smart-drive assistants for improved safety.