When disaster strikes, it is critical that experts, decision-makers, and emergency personnel have access to real-time information in order to assess the situation and respond appropriately. Individuals and organizations need to be able to analyze the wealth of data generated in the midst of the disaster by using smartphones, mobile apps, and social media platforms.
Information technology is providing new ways to improve disaster management. Today, new computer systems and networks from sensor networks, to smartphones, and cyber physical systems are giving rise to powerful data streams able to take timely and effective action during disasters.
The National Science Foundation (NSF) www.nsf.gov and the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) www.jst.go.jp/EN have joined together to support research on Big Data and data analytics to use to transform disaster management.
The two agencies have announced awards for six joint U.S Japan research projects to address capturing and processing data associated with disasters and how to improve the responsiveness of emerging computer systems and networks in the face of disasters.
Each of the NSF/JST funded projects includes one team from the U.S and one team from Japan. NSF’s awards support the U.S researchers on each team for a total of $1.8 million over three years.
One research project involves researchers from Arizona State University www.asu.edu and Japan’s National Institute of Informatics www.nii.ac.jp/en to explore resilient networks, social media mining, and information dissemination during disasters.
Another research project will enable Temple University www.temple.edu and the University of Aizu www.asu.edu in Japan to collaborate on designing smartphone-based ad hoc emergency networks that can evolve as a disaster unfolds.
Other university collaborations involve Johns Hopkins University www.jhu.edu and the University of Tokyo www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/en, Missouri University of Science and Technology www.mst.edu and Osaka University www.osaka-u.ac.jp, Florida International University www.fiu.edu and the University of Tokyo, the University of Southern California www.usc.edu, and the National Institute of Informatics.
These university collaborative projects involve designing a computer platform to analyze incoming data, designing user specific information delivery systems to provide information to citizens, developing new methods to compress, transmit, be able to query data from sensor networks, and developing new search algorithms using sensors to identify sources of pollutants released in the air or sea.