SUGAR

SUGAR is a highly innovative collaborative project proposal led by Corinne Dejous (IMS, University of Bordeaux) expected to be submitted to the next FETOPEN-01 2018 2019 2020 “Challenging Current Thinking” (EC Horizon 2020 Research & Innovation Framework Programme) call. Based on an international consortium highly interdisciplinary and fully oriented toward inclusive innovation, SUGAR targets a visionary, collaborative effort to address human population needs in critical situations where classical technological solutions relying on power and communication infrastructures are defaulting or nil. Such a situation occurs repeatedly in remote areas and disaster & emergency response. SUGAR opens a new paradigm for Frugal Technology by circumventing widely accessible objects and materials to solve complex problems, advocating advanced consciousness of environmental and economic sustainability fit for adaptation to 21st century societal and environmental issues worldwide. The overarching aim of SUGAR is to overcome critical situations where impacted populations lack reliable grid power or communication network by developing a green and fair ICT first-aid kit in the shape of a Swiss army-like smartphone extension accessible to all. To do so, SUGAR will rely on a highly interdisciplinary European consortium led by Prof. Corinne Dejous (IMS) engaged in radical thinking to tackle fair communication and effective disaster response with a frugal (low-cost, easy-to-source, easy to fabricate, low power consumption) smartphone extension. The consortium partners will share SUGAR philosophy, targeting inclusive innovation, in an accessible and «FAIR» approach. As expected in FETOPEN 01 research, radical thinking emerges from considering that 1) cell-phone batteries as the only widely and immediately accessible reliable source of energy worldwide and 2) cell-phones include computing capabilities, speaker and microphone, RF front-end, which makes them a versatile resource and a possible hub for peripheral devices. SUGAR consortium will therefore aim to develop breakthrough technology by building upon a bidirectional wireless power and communication platform between smartphone and targeted modular sheet. Interactions between electronics specialists and ecotoxicology and medical experts will enable the development of data/energy (WP1), FM communicating (WP2) and environmental/health sensing (WP3&WP4) modules. Specifically, sensing modules will explore toxicity detection especially in water, and medical monitoring based on relevant physiological parameters. Interdisciplinary of the SUGAR consortium and advisory board will benefit widespread application and relevance of the developed technology by further interactions of biological, technological and social science experts with manufacturers and end-users such as NGOs or impacted populations. As such a Minimum Viable Product will be tested in situ in the context of emergency response or remote location in emerging countries. Following the inclusive innovation and fair approach of the SUGAR project, frugal technological development will be co-constructed with expected engagement of impacted populations via citizen science (WP5) leading to the definition of inclusive innovation research policy for effective and widespread application of SUGAR smart frugal surface. The core consortium with academic partners (IMS&CED, France; IT-WC, Portugal) and a technological research center (Holst Centre, The Netherlands) is especially relevant and complementary to address this disruptive technological goal, bringing contributions on wireless energy and data transmission circuits (IMS, IT-WC), radio-communication systems (IT-WC), printed technologies (Holst Centre), health-related and environmental sensors (IMS, Holst Centre), sociology of science and technology (CED). The intended full consortium will include team specializing in ecotoxicology and an industry actor, each module implying synergistic collaborations.