The apartment of the future has a lot of invisible technology.
How can your own apartment contribute to making life safer and more comfortable for all of us, but especially for the elderly and people with disabilities? Institutes of the TU Braunschweig are researching this question jointly with Nibelungen-Wohnbau-GmbH and the building cooperative ›Wiederaufbau‹ eG. In the project “The apartment of the future - AAL apartments in research and practice”, intensive research is being carried out in several apartments - and people are already living in them. The Leine-Weser Regional Development Office of the State of Lower Saxony and the Hanover Braunschweig Göttingen Wolfsburg GmbH metropolitan region are promoting the joint project of the market participants.
The origins of the research project are the challenges of demographic change: the aging population places new demands on safety, comfort and medical care, because mobility decreases with age, the risk of illness and the number of people living alone increase. Still leading a self-determined life in your own apartment is a key future issue.
Private living space must increasingly offer more than “just” accessibility and more than “smart home”. There is a demand for age-appropriate assistance systems (Ambient Assisted Living, AAL) that offer additional safety and health support in everyday life. In addition to intelligent light, electricity or heating control, this includes, above all, reporting systems and sensors that turn the private four walls into a diagnostic-therapeutic space: the apartment becomes the third health location next to clinics and doctors' practices.
Future living is being researched in six automated apartments equipped with 600 microcomputers. Institutes of the TU Braunschweig, including the Institute for Data Technology and Communication Networks and the team around Dr. Harald Schrom and Nibelungen-Wohnbau-GmbH have equipped the apartments with barely visible, intelligent, embedded building technology.
Dr. Jonas Schwartze
Peter L. Reichertz Institut für Medizinische Informatik (PLRI)
Technische Universität Braunschweig und Medizinische Hochschule Hannover
Research Assistant
Raum: IZ434, Mühlenpfordtstraße 23, 38106 Braunschweig, Deutschland
Tel: +49 531 391-9513, Mobil: +49 151 46128111
jonas.schwartze(at)plri.de
www.plri.de