SOPRANO Project is online

SOPRANO ProjectSOPRANO stands for "Service-oriented Programmable Smart Environments for Older Europeans" and is an Integrated Project in the European Commission's 6th Framework Programme (IST Priority 6th Call on Ambient Assisted Living -AAL). The SOPRANO project is to develop affordable, smart ICT-based assisted living services with interfaces which are easy to use for older people and familiar in their home environment.

The new EC Programme on AAL, of which SOPRANO is part, was launched against a background of accelerating demographic ageing. The EC research is to show how technologies such as computers, the internet and mobile communications - which already pervade many aspects of everyday life - can be used to tackle emerging problems and in particular contribute to improved quality of life for older people.

The SOPRANO system, installed in homes, is to enable provision of flexible, individualised supportive services and health care, to promote continued ability to live independently, to help integrate people with functional impairments into social life and so to maximise their independence and help them retain their dignity. Services based on SOPRANO are to enable living just like everyone else - having opportunities to make decisions that affect one's life and being able to pursue activities of one's own choosing. Involvement of the community, as well as an older person's family, neighbours and friends in service provision is part of the approach. Assisted living already serves a broad range of elderly people and provides a bridge between active retirement living and, for some, care in a nursing facility.

Three strands of research and development are to be integrated:

  • Stand alone assistive technology: products designed to compensate for motor, sensory and cognitive difficulties frequently experienced by older adults;
  • Smart home technology: networking of ICT in the home environment, with the integration of appliances and devices to provide control of the entire living space;
  • Telecare services: applications addressing care-related needs prevalent among older people, with ICT utilised to enable support from professionals and informal carers.

The technical architecture will enable pro-active assistance by interpreting information gathered by the system about a user's situation. Responses are to follow agreed rules and seamless access provided to external professionals. Safety and security is strongly enhanced with adherence to stringent reliability standards. Interaction with users by voice and TV helps meet special accessibility and usability needs. Services utilising SOPRANO capabilities are to be designed for older people, including those with age-related cognitive changes. To ensure that services fully meet user needs, developers will work with potential users of SOPRANO systems throughout the project lifecycle, from user requirements, through iterative prototyping, validation of concepts and functionality and usability tests to large-scale field trials involving users in their own homes.

The SOPRANO consortium of enterprises, public bodies and (university) research institutes comprises over 20 partners from 7 European countries, namely Greece, Germany, UK, Netherlands, Spain, Slovenia and Ireland, headed by EXODUS (Greece).

For further information, please visit:
http://www.soprano-ip.org

Most Popular Now

Unlocking the 10 Year Health Plan

The government's plan for the NHS is a huge document. Jane Stephenson, chief executive of SPARK TSL, argues the key to unlocking its digital ambitions is to consider what it...

Alcidion Grows Top Talent in the UK, wit…

Alcidion has today announced the addition of three new appointments to their UK-based team, with one internal promotion and two external recruits. Dr Paul Deffley has been announced as the...

New Training Year Starts at Siemens Heal…

In September, 197 school graduates will start their vocational training or dual studies in Germany at Siemens Healthineers. 117 apprentices and 80 dual students will begin their careers at Siemens...

AI can Find Cancer Pathologists Miss

Men assessed as healthy after a pathologist analyses their tissue sample may still have an early form of prostate cancer. Using AI, researchers at Uppsala University have been able to...

AI, Full Automation could Expand Artific…

Automated insulin delivery (AID) systems such as the UVA Health-developed artificial pancreas could help more type 1 diabetes patients if the devices become fully automated, according to a new review...

How AI could Speed the Development of RN…

Using artificial intelligence (AI), MIT researchers have come up with a new way to design nanoparticles that can more efficiently deliver RNA vaccines and other types of RNA therapies. After training...

MIT Researchers Use Generative AI to Des…

With help from artificial intelligence, MIT researchers have designed novel antibiotics that can combat two hard-to-treat infections: drug-resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae and multi-drug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). Using generative AI algorithms, the research...

AI Hybrid Strategy Improves Mammogram In…

A hybrid reading strategy for screening mammography, developed by Dutch researchers and deployed retrospectively to more than 40,000 exams, reduced radiologist workload by 38% without changing recall or cancer detection...

Are You Eligible for a Clinical Trial? C…

A new study in the academic journal Machine Learning: Health discovers that ChatGPT can accelerate patient screening for clinical trials, showing promise in reducing delays and improving trial success rates. Researchers...

Global Study Reveals How Patients View M…

How physicians feel about artificial intelligence (AI) in medicine has been studied many times. But what do patients think? A team led by researchers at the Technical University of Munich...

New AI Tool Addresses Accuracy and Fairn…

A team of researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai has developed a new method to identify and reduce biases in datasets used to train machine-learning algorithms...

AI Analysis of Colonoscopy Improves Asse…

In a new study, artificial intelligence (AI) matched and potentially exceeded the performance of gastroenterologists and conventional scoring in evaluating endoscopies of Crohn’s disease patients. The results, published in Clinical Gastroenterology...