Canarin – A Cloud-based Real-time Environment Monitoring System
Macao Polytechnic University develops the potential capacity of interdisciplinary research to contribute to global sustainability. Canarin is a cloud-based environment monitoring system harnessing advanced and intelligent sensing technologies to aggregate environmental data in real-time through research partnerships for the preservation of world cultural heritage and sustainable urban development.
Big Data Innovation to Collect Environmental Data
Our award-winning environment monitoring system Canarin draws upon the potential of big data to collect real-time environmental data of parameters such as PM2.5, UV radiation, atmospheric pressure, temperature and humidity. This intelligent way of monitoring environmental change effectively replaces the traditional fixed-point systems, which is greatly beneficial to monitor air quality and enhance urban environment.
System in Service to Preserve World Heritage
The system informs the preservation of historic documents, installations, buildings, and sites. Its current adoption to the centuries-old Joanina Library and the Science Museum of the University of Coimbra, Portugal protects world heritage and the precious book collections. Custom-designed system provides solutions under the circumstances of incremental number of visitors.
Informing Policy-making Decisions to Build Carbon-neutral Smart City
Integrated with smart mobility, the system is applied to the historic city of Bologna to facilitate efficient policy making through analysing the wealth of data. In an outdoor context, shared bicycles are equipped with the system which tracks movements and air pollution emissions. Taking advantage of the city’s digital communication infrastructure, the data are transferred in real-time to the server, being accessible to the government and the public to inform policy-making decisions and enhance well-being in life.
Portable Intelligence on Individuals
Canarin has been tailor-made as a personal, portable version alongside the cloud-based real-time environmental monitoring functions. This version is also enabled to capture data on a number of pollutants and other environmental factors. It can also perform data localization and geo-tagging to assess air quality based on the preset algorithms. Last but not least, its small size and weight make the system more mobilized, yet the data accuracy remains at high level.
Partnerships for Sustainability Goals
Partners of the Canarin project with Macao Polytechnic University include Asian Institute of Technology in Thailand, and University of Bologna in Italy. The research team is formed by international scholars and scientists in the fields of science and technology as well as cultural heritage conservation.
International Recognition
Being an international research patent of MPU in big data technology, the Canarin system was showcased at the G7 Environment Summit held in Italy, which was an event to promote cross-sectoral dialogues and international cooperation. In addition, the system has won the Gold Award of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region Universities IT Project Competition, as well as the Silver Award of the Asia Pacific Information and Communication Technology Alliance (APICTA) Award.