Artificial Intelligence (AI) is getting increasingly sophisticated day by day in its application, with enhanced efficiency and speed at a lower cost. Every single sector has been reaping benefits from AI in recent times. The Healthcare industry is no exception. Here is decoding the future trajectory of healthcare with AI.

The impact of artificial intelligence in the healthcare industry through machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP) is transforming care delivery. Additionally, patients are expected to gain relatively high access to their health-related information than before through various applications such as smart wearable devices and mobile electronic medical records (EMR).

With a huge amount of accurate data from these devices, AI will help facilitate actionable optimizing care and promote personalized healthcare.

The personalized healthcare will authorize patients to take the wheel of their well-being, facilitate high-end healthcare, and promote better patient-provider communication to underprivileged areas.

Major players in the market are diving in headfirst to become a part of an on-going transformation in the industry.

For instance, IBM Watson for Health is helping healthcare organizations to apply cognitive technology to provide a vast amount of power diagnosis and health-related information.

In addition, Google’s DeepMind Health is collaborating with researchers, clinicians, and patients in order to solve real-world healthcare problems. Additionally, the company has combined systems neuroscience with machine learning to develop strong general-purpose learning algorithms within neural networks to mimic the human brain.

AI Healthcare Programs and Robust Investments to Accelerate Medical Research

Companies are working towards developing AI technology to solve several existing challenges, especially within the healthcare space. Strong focus on funding and starting AI healthcare programs played a significant role in Microsoft Corporation’s decision to launch a 5-year, US$ 40 million program known as AI for Health in January 2019.

The Microsoft program will use artificial intelligence tools to resolve some of the greatest healthcare challenges including global health crises, treatment, and disease diagnosis. Microsoft has also ensured that academia, non-profit, and research organizations have access to this technology, technical experts, and resources to leverage AI for care delivery and research.

Collaborations with research organizations and various universities also remain a key focus area of the market players.

In January 2020, these factors influenced Takeda Pharmaceuticals Company and MIT’s School of Engineering to join hands for three years to drive innovation and application of AI in the healthcare industry and drug development.

AI Revolutionizing Health Care with Major Breakthroughs

AI applications are only centered on three main investment areas: Diagnostics, Engagement, and Digitization. With the rapid advancement in technologies. There are exciting breakthroughs in incorporating AI in medical services.

Some of the major AI breakthroughs revolutionizing the healthcare industry include:

• Robot Doctors:
  

  The most interesting aspect of AI is robots. Robots are not only replacing trained medical staff but also making them more efficient in several areas. Robots help in controlling the cost while potentially providing better care and performing accurate surgery in limited space.

  China and the U.S. have started investing in the development of robots to support doctors. In November 2017, a robot in China passed a medical licensing exam using only an AI brain. Also, it was the first-ever semi-automated operating robot that was used to suture blood vessels as fine as 0.03 mm.

  Moreover, the rise in the number of coronavirus cases has threatened the global population.

  In order to prevent coronavirus from spreading, the American doctors are relying on a robot that can measure the patient’s act and vitals. In addition, robots are also being used for recovery and consulting assistance and transporting units. These robots are showcasing significant potential in revolutionizing medical procedures in the future.

• Precision Medication:
  

  Precision medicine is an emerging approach to disease prevention and treatment. The precision medication approach allows researchers and doctors to predict more accurate treatment and prevention strategies.

  The advent of precision medicine technology has allowed healthcare to actively track patient’s physiology in real-time, take multi-dimensional data, and create predictive algorithms that use collective learnings to calculate individual outcomes.

  In recent years, there has been an immense focus on enabling direct-to-consumer genomics. Now, companies are aiming to create patient-centric products within digitization processes and genomics related to ordering complex testing in clinics.

  In January 2020, ixLayer, a start-up based in San-Francisco, launched one of its kind precision health testing platforms to enhance the delivery of diagnostic testing and to shorten the complex relationship among physicians, precision health tests, and patients.

• Personal Health Assistant:
  

  Personal health monitoring is a promising example of AI in healthcare. With the emergence of advanced AI and Internet of Medical Things (IoMT), demand for consumer-oriented products such as smart wearables for monitoring well-being is growing significantly.

  Owing to the rapid proliferation of smart wearables and mobile apps, enterprises are introducing varied options to monitor personal health.

  In October 2019, Gali Health, a health technology company, introduced its Gali AI-powered personal health assistant for people suffering from inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD). It offers health tracking and analytical tools, medically-vetted educational resources, and emotional support to the IBD community.

  Similarly, start-ups are also coming forward with innovative devices integrated with state-of-the-art AI technology to contribute to the growing demand for personal health monitoring.

• Medical Imaging:
  

  In recent years, AI has been used in numerous ways to support the medical imaging of all kinds. At present, the biggest use for AI is to assist in the analysis of images and perform single narrow recognition tasks.

  In the United States, AI is considered highly valuable in enhancing business operations and patients care. It has the greatest impact on patient care by improving the accuracy of clinical outcomes and medical diagnosis.

  Strong presence of leading market players in the country is bolstering the demand for medical imaging in hospitals and research centers.

  In January 2020, Hitachi Healthcare Americas announced to start a new dedicated R&D center in North America. Medical imaging will leverage the advancements in machine learning and artificial intelligence to bring about next-gen of medical imaging technology.

With a plethora of issues driven by the growing rate of chronic disease and the aging population, the need for new innovative solutions in the healthcare industry is moving on an upswing.

Countering AI Challenges in Healthcare Industry

Unleashing AI’s complete potential in the healthcare industry is not an easy task. Both healthcare providers and AI developers together will have to tackle all the obstacles on the path towards the integration of new technologies.

Clearing all the hurdles will need a compounding of technological refinement and shifting mindsets. As AI trend become more deep-rooted, it is giving rise to highly ubiquitous discussions. Will AI replace the doctors and medical professionals, especially radiologists and physicians? The answer to this is, it will increase the efficiency of the medical professionals.

Increasing efficiency of the medical professionals ensures high precision than before, detect life-threatening diseases, and the ability to better monitor the patient.

Initiatives by IBM Watson and Google’s DeepMind will soon unlock the critical answers. However, AI aims to mimic the human brain in healthcare, human judgment, and intuitions that cannot be substituted.

Even though AI is augmenting in existing capabilities of the industry, it is unlikely to fully replace human intervention. AI skilled forces will swap only those who don’t want to embrace technology.

AI in Healthcare Industry – The Next Frontier

Healthcare is a dynamic industry with significant opportunities. However, uncertainty, cost concerns, and complexity are making it an unnerving one.

The best opportunity for healthcare in the near future are hybrid models, where clinicians and physicians will be supported for treatment planning, diagnosis, and identifying risk factors. Also, with an increase in the number of geriatric population and the rise of health-related concerns across the globe, the overall burden of disease management has augmented.

Patients are also expecting better treatment and care. Due to growing innovations in the healthcare industry with respect to improved diagnosis and treatment, AI has gained consideration among the patients and doctors.

Healthcare institutes, government administration, and big IT firms are investing significantly in AI to make healthcare manageable for everyone at a reduced cost.

In order to develop better medical technology, entrepreneurs, healthcare service providers, investors, policy developers, and patients are coming together.

These factors are set to exhibit a brighter future of AI in the healthcare industry. It is extremely likely that there will be widespread use and massive advancements of AI integrated technology in the next few years. Moreover, healthcare providers are expected to invest in adequate IT infrastructure solutions and data centers to support new technological development.

Healthcare companies should continually integrate new technologies to build strong value and to keep the patient’s attention.

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The insights presented in the article are based on a recent research study on Global Artificial Intelligence In Healthcare Market by Future Market Insights.

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Augmented Reality (AR) gained familiarity in households with the 2016’s launch of PokemonGo. Although it is still being perceived to be in its infancy, it is not. It has had extensive applicability in some or the other way across multiple verticals over the past decade, and now, has landed up capturing immense interest from the world of retail.

In recent years, while Virtual Reality (VR) has been taking the entertainment industry by storm, AI is seemingly finding its own foothold in retail. With AR in clear picture, augmentation of the real world with superimposed perceptions stays no more a tech-dream, rather a reality of the near future. The consumer has been at the center stage for businesses. Today, almost everything that businesses do is focused on what and how their customers want.

While the success of retail game continues to revolve around delivering ever-superior customer experience, technological blessings such as AR will remain an indubitable part of the journey towards achieving it. A high level of interactive, communicative, and appealing customer experience that businesses can offer with AR allows both customers and brands to indulge in a completely new, immersive environment.

The past couple of years are a sign that AR in retail world has already embarked on a mission to enhance both the sides of the retail coin — online and brick-and-mortar — to transform forever the way people have been shopping. Ultimately, it is intended to blur the lines between offline and online retail, impacting all the stages of sales funnel — to craft an improved customer experience at the end.

AR’s immersive experiences are best absorbed by the retail industry.

Whether it is about delivering an enhanced customer experience by bringing the entire in-store experience to households or creating outstanding brand awareness by incorporating AR in products, retail industry ranks top when it comes to leveraging the most of what AR offers. A sizeable chunk of shopping population now prefers to shop at retailers that provide an AR experience, which clearly points to the fact that those who realize the potential of AR early will survive the bottleneck over those who still choose to remain incognizant.

How does AR facilitate customer engagement?

• Immersive product catalogs probably make the best advantage of using AR in retail. With an option to preview desirable products, 3D product catalogs become a boon especially for those online retail brands that do not own a physical store or showroom.
• AR-enabled product catalogs to allow such retailers to construct appropriate AR apps to showcase an entire products range that is on sale. While this will potentially curtail the rate of product returns, brands can expect considerable savings in this customer service area.
• Product categories such as cosmetics, apparel, and accessories among others are made available to customers for virtual trial, via AR. With customizable UX content and a wide selection range to choose from, AR can effectively facilitate purchasing decision of customers.
• Convenient and informative in-store navigation is another exceptional benefit that AR offers to retail consumers. Mobile apps even aid in creating precise shopping lists and guide customers through the product locations accordingly.
• Retail leaders are already frontrunners in adopting AR technology to strategize on appealing marketing tactics. Capturing consumer sentiments, modern retail advertising can lure Gen X and Millennial consumers through AR-powered apps.

AR is traversing multiple product categories.

Clothing & shoes, furniture & décor, and groceries are currently the most popular categories among shoppers of AR-enabled retail stores, online and offline. Jewelry and makeup & cosmetics are witnessing a spectacular surge in sales at AR retail stores, of late. Kids’ toys are observed to be another rapidly emerging segment among shoppers, when it comes to tracking consumer preference at AR retail brand stores. On the other side, with an expanding population that is increasingly preferring shopping via smartphone apps of brands, it is more likely that the role of mobile applications in popularizing implementation of AR in retail.

More than half of the shoppers look at AR as simply a fun shopping tool, whereas more than that wish to know more about the product information through AR. The almost 3/4^th’s of the shoppers’ asked, wanted AR enabled features, to look for a particular size, style, shape, color. Customers wanted to understand other similar features of products, says research. Unsurprisingly, AR is emerging as desirable among retail brands at a breakneck pace.

Fashion, furniture, shoes, and more — brands are embracing AR.

A popular furniture brand based in Sweden, Ikea, was one of the first retailers to launch an AR catalog that let customers visualize the actual placement and appearance of furniture in their homes. Creating a hype around their new sneaker launch, Nike also did an effective use of AR technology.

Airwalk’s AR powered invisible pop-up store was a big hit and one of its kind that delivered excellent results in a short period, in terms of promotion of Airwalk Jim — the brand’s limited edition re-launch. Zara’s in-store AR displays have been a breakthrough for fashion retail. 3D technology fitting room features by GAP’s AR app is another example of revolutionizing retail in the clothing and accessories category.

AR-enabled in-store interactive mirrors will remain an excellent marketing solution for makeup, cosmetics, and accessories brands. Moreover, intelligent dressing rooms that operate by touch screens will provide detailed information about product availability in clothing segment that customers inside rooms are trying on.

While there are several more use cases of AR appearing on the retail horizon every day, the exact measurement of the effectiveness of this technology still seems to be in an unexplored realm. Brands ought to gather an all-inclusive adequate AR-based data reflecting their customers’ actual AR retail experience to know what they are thinking about, and more importantly, what they’re not thinking about.

The insights presented in the article are based on a recent research study on AR in Retail Market by Future Market Insights.

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Ever since internet was introduced to the world, it has undergone startling evolution. What began by connecting institutions and businesses for efficient work, no connects everything from our bodies, homes, communities to goods and services and our whole ecosystem. All of these factors are a enough for a ‘perfect storm’- read: Internet of Things (IoT), which has nearly engulfed every ‘thing’ and changed the way we live over the next decade. IoT’s unimaginable vast network where people-to-people, people-to-things, and things-to-things are connected, our living ecosystem is fundamentally changing because not just how decisions are taken, but who makes them and where are those decisions taken will impact our work and homes.

Among other connected things including the buildings we live in, products we buy, the food we eat, the room we sleep in, our food and the soil we grow- everything potentially a part of IoT, key leaders involved in the IoT technology development are looking at the next important step- Smart Luggage . Whether traveling by rail or flight, travelers always have to be careful with their luggage as the fear of bags being stolen, mislaid or harmed in any way always exists.

Smart Luggage Means Never Having to Worry about Your Bags Ever Again

Tag, Track and, Locate: Though carryon baggage lets travelers skip the queue, checking in those bags is time consuming and labor intensive task, as travelers need to print tags, secure them to their bags and drop-off at the check in counters. In a bid to simplify this process, a Germany-based luggage manufacturer rolled out a range of suitcases that comes with an embedded E Ink display. Same size as the standard paper luggage tag, E Ink display gathers data from either supported airline mobile application or the manufacturer’s own app. The airline app then have to simply use its check-in feature and sync it with the electronic tag- helping the airline to drop-off luggage at the dedicated airport counter. The luggage manufacturer also claims that its own app can also be used for initiation as well as switching the tag to contact information mode – making the E Ink display useful even if the airlines or airports do not support electronic tags. Presently available at available at Munich, Hamburg and Frankfurt airports, smart luggage tags have major potential.

Missing or permanently lost baggage are a nightmare for travelers. The feeling is sinking to say the least. With advanced IoT based solutions, travelers would never have to worry about losing their bags. With the help of radio frequency identification (RFID) technology, data stored in the smart luggage tags can be consistently and accurately captured by scanners utilizing radio waves. This makes way for simple and effective tracking. Travelers are literally omnipresent with their bags at all times- ensuring they have made it on to the plane and unloaded at the other ‘relevant’ final destination. The RFID technology- likely to be used at 344 airports around the world with a success rate of 99.9% after numerous trials coupled with management reporting systems- will make baggage handling efficient.

Secure with a Lock: Considering how easy it is to lock luggage and lose the key to it or forget passwords, advanced ways to smart lock luggage are in contention. Among the contenders: locks that allows users to easily unlock the luggage through a tap on their smartphones, locking and unlocking using fingerprint ID, smart baggage locks with GPS that would enable travelers to check on their bag and ensure it is still locked along with real-time along with notifications when the bag is loaded onto a plane. The smart luggage locks uses Near Field Communication (NFC) NFC and a battery or at times smart locks can also be accessed using a pre-paired NFC smart sticker– that travelers can put in their wallet, in case of non-availability of an NFC-enabled device.

Knock off Weighty-issues: Ceiling on baggage weight is the biggest gripe for flyers. While manufacturers have made advancements in materials and design along with other features such as GPS tracking, many players are beginning to take a hold and have come up with smart inbuilt scale that would indicate- on the phone screen the luggage’s weight- on pulling the handle of the suitcase and if it meets the airline’s baggage requirements.

Remote-controlled Smart Wheels: Even those most luggage have wheels attached to them, travelers still have to trawl it. To further enhance the traveler experience and more it less harrowing, smart luggage that does not need trailing are doing rounds. These smart luggage, having wheels can be controlled by a remote.

Additionally, to get the smart luggage game even more high-tech, a groundbreaking ‘seeing’ suitcase was introduced in the smart luggage market last month, and is billed as the world’s first ever ‘vision-powered carry-on’. Powered by ‘Computer Vision’, the luxury smart luggage recognizes its user and analyzes surroundings. The suitcase is designed to move alongside its user at the speed of 6 mph in “Side Follow” mode. And, in case of an obstruction, the suitcase will stop, drop back and follow from behind.

Smart Luggage That Convert into Beds, Kitchen, and Offices?

Did you ever want to have a bed, kitchen and, work station all combined in your luggage? The answer is in a suitcase that the world welcomed last month, designed by an Australian-born designer. The smart luggage made of aluminum and wood exterior and leather interiors– come in various designs. The smart suitcase can be converted into a work desk and a sleeping bag- with cushions and side frames to keep accessories and belongings. In the next phase, the company is also set to launch a series of smart, luxurious suitcase that will work as a kitchen with foldable chopping table, mini fridge, built-in power supply and drawers for cutlery.

Are Smart Luggage Secure? Multiple Bans, Poor Enforcement, Information Theft to Decelerate Market

The smart luggage is in for some challenges after the US airlines put a ban on lithium-ion batteries. These batteries are what make a luggage ‘smart’- is highly inflammable and could cause a fire break mid-flight. Although, Lithium-ion batteries present in devices like laptops and suitcases are acceptable, the ones present in smart luggage are not owing to the fact that these are often pushed in the overhead cabin. However, to ease this ban, airlines are allowing travelers to carry such smart luggage only after removing the batteries. But this raises two issues: firstly, removing batteries can be an extremely difficult task as it would involve a lot of unscrewing and wire snipping of the smart luggage, and secondly it would be stripped off its ‘smart’ functionality, reducing it to a regular luggage. The ban went in full effect starting early this year leaving a number of companies in a tough spot.  However, poor implementation of this ban- wherein TSA- approved smart luggage are allowed, could add to the pain of manufacturers and could be a major drawback for the smart luggage market, restraining people from buying one. Travelers will be allowed to carry on or check in their smart luggage as long it has removable battery.

Owing to connectivity issues, feasibility of smart luggage is limited to only airports and is expected to be one of the major areas of concern. Additionally, since these products have wires, screws, battery chargers and RFID tags often confuse TSA scanners. Also, security factors such as theft of personal and confidential data including travel itinerary are expected to slow down the smart luggage market growth.

This fallout has definitely affected the smart luggage market and if the restrictions continue, many other smart luggage manufacturers will either start looking for new technological advancements or fold entirely. Although, some manufacturers have already started making onboard batteries modular instead of integrated ones, the full potential of smart luggage is yet to be realized.

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Thanks to ‘all things smart and intelligent,” from interactive fitness trackers and smart thermostats to driverless vehicles and connected smart kitchens, the Internet of Things (IoT) has witnessed increased adoption- to make our lives smarter and more interactive, in recent years.

As the Internet of Things continues to pervade the enterprise and consumer worlds, according to a report by Goldman Sachs, the IoT is likely to connect as many as 28 billion devices (or “things” as they call it) to the Internet by 2020- connected Wearable Devices, cars, homes, cities, transportation, oil and gas, healthcare and the industrial internet.

Not Just Connectivity, Telecom Must Leverage the Most of IoT to Deliver Value-Based Services

Given all the hype around IoT and the advantages it brings along, the telecommunications industry is one of the fastest-growing markets, providing enhanced connectivity solutions to numerous smart devices. By combining connectivity, analysis, mobile, security, and cloud to support business- this crossroads could prove to be a revenue opportunity for the telecom operators, who are increasingly making use of digital platforms.

However, owing to the fact that consumer’s data and connectivity requirements are volatile apropos to the IoT and digitization advancements, it is fundamental for telecom companies to redefine their business strategies, including key offerings around IoT. Considering that the telecom players have the strongest position in the IoT value chain, they must start moving up the IoT value chain and start offering accordingly.

Hit the Bull’s Eye with IoT customized Offerings

1. IoT specific price plans: With the outburst of IoT and consumers fascinate with it, even more, telecom players should leverage this attention and focus on building specialized price plans and provide connectivity as per the IoT services.
2. Create information pools: Considering that telecom providers will receive unimaginable sets of deep data from numerous IoT devices, telecom companies can create vast information pools which can be later used for gaining business insights, predictive modeling and, build specific solutions.
3. Device cloud for effective management: With the widespread adoption of IoT, an increasing number of enterprises are unlocking the valuable data generated by their everyday operations, which they later use to uncover new business opportunities. However, if IoT and data are the heroes, the real stars are the connected devices that collect this data. It is essential that telecom players actively monitor and manage these devices utilizing device cloud. By building a platform like this, other industries and companies can use it for managing their devices.

Protect IoT data with Blockchain

Growth of IoT has a direct impact on the security of data. Considering that not every system can be secured fully, protecting data becomes cardinal for all IoT space businesses. However, organizations can consider applying strong multiple layers of security to make it time-consuming and costly for hackers. This layer of security is called Blockchain.

According to industry experts, at the time of cyber-attacks, IoT devices are unable to gauge the situation and make a security decision.

Blockchain, on the contrary, understands this behavior and enables device networks to protect themselves by allowing devices to form group consensus about what is normal within a given network, and negate any activity that might seem unusual.

Additionally, research has shown that Blockchain is not limited to just transactional data and can record anything.

This recording can be further used for managing assets, maintaining devices including repairs and breakdowns and, recovering device history could be used to record just about anything and is not limited to transactional data.

The ‘smart’ devices are often unable to unmeasured these threats, which may often lead to loss of a massive amount of data ad critical failure. If estimates are to be believed, 1 in 5 IoT devices will deploy basic blockchain by 2020.

Ultimately, using blockchain for IoT transactions and data sharing could easily beef up security, remove failures, streamline processes and prove to be cost-effective. Considering that the ‘blocks’ in the blockchain are only available to organizations with the right encryption key.

Marry IoT and Contracts for ‘Smart Contracts’

In the massive IoT space, it is difficult to know who you are connecting to, blockchain solves these trust issues, but ‘smart contracts’ could be a game-changer in the telecom IoT space.

Smart contracts define the rules and regulation of information sharing, which may help complex business operations to track various functions of data and what happens to it at each step. Smart contracts are especially helpful when proof is required.

Additionally, not only does smart contracts- a verified set of parameters that is publically available on the blockchain, govern data, it also automatically enforces those obligations.

Partnership Is the Key to Success

Although IoT has consuming various verticals, the telecom industry is still trying to identify its role in the IoT space, considering that till now, their pricing model has been volume-based and not performance.  This has been quite complex for the telecom industry to determine what services and how their network could add value for IoT consumers.

The world is getting more and more consumed by telecom IoT, providers need to move beyond just providing connectivity.

Providers will want to find smarter ways to deliver more value-based services to their customers and partners.

The telecom ecosystem needs to turn towards a more rewarding revenue system rather than just focusing on connecting devices and partner with the right solution partners and system integrators.

An example of this collaboration is online gaming, wherein connection speed is critical.

The connection speed determines the outcome of the game and not necessarily a huge amount of data over the internet. Online gamers, as compared to other internet users, were not always the favorites of telecom providers. Providers ofter prioritize cost over latency, routing traffic through the cheapest paths, which were not necessarily the fastest.

Not so much for other internet users who download things from the internet at their own will and time; the difference becomes absolutely clear in real-time applications where lags affect the games.

With 5G, the telecom industry can offer new levels of latency. However, more than just network connectivity, the telecom industry can offer more to gaming companies, including specialized servers and routers.

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The past decade has seen hundreds of natural disasters in various countries. While the US stays one of the most affected ones, developing countries remain the major sufferers particularly due to denser population and poor evacuation infrastructure. Catastrophic events lead to massive destruction of property and incalculable loss of human and animal life, and handling the post-event adversity is an extremely challenging task that follows.

Is IoT making an impact in efficient natural disaster preparedness?

With adverse climate change becoming more of a concern for the entire world, experts continue to explore the use of the Internet of Things technology in addressing and optimizing the emergencies that arise as a result of natural calamities. Whether the occurrence includes earthquake, tsunami, wildfire, volcanic eruption, flood, hurricane, tornado, landslide, extreme weather conditions, or any geological process, the loss is often uncontrollable. However, we are fortunately in an era where the immense advancement in technology can help to reduce the intensity of immediate and eventual effects. To be precise, the Internet of Things technology has become sophisticated in no time – extending its practical application areas. Several researchers, scientists, and IoT experts from around the world have been taking efforts to deploy this smart technology in minimizing the destruction caused due to natural disasters.

IoT, although cannot prevent any disaster from happening, can definitely aid in efficient disaster preparedness. It has been found to be useful in predicting the upcoming event and delivering an early warning to community through smart systems.

Why is IoT a highly potential technology in disaster prediction and management?

The very first application is, by default, to minimize and possibly prevent the risk of a natural catastrophic event. With the help of GIS, smart devices, and satellite communication, the IoT technology can be used to design the systems meant for early warning.

Following this, awareness about the upcoming event is another important application. What could create awareness and offer quick guidelines about the preparedness better than social media? Conventional media also play a major role.

Real-time communication in order to deliver an emergency response is the next potential application of IoT here.

The most challenging and probably the most exhaustive job that follows any disastrous event is recovery and rescue. The IoT technology can be efficiently used in creating online systems that search missing people and even manage emergency funds.

Moreover, IoT-enabled devices and systems can function as an alternative way for communication when the conventional infrastructure for communication is poor, sensitive, or not working. Though the latest innovations in IoT do not directly account for disaster preparedness, they do bring about excellent disaster resilience. However, deployment of IoT-enabled devices helps here in a totally different way. It does not help in disaster preparedness and resilience but enables a viable option to communicate in such circumstances, in form of limited or emergency communication.

How do IoT sensors contribute in disaster preparedness?

IoT sensors development is perceived to be an excellent innovation that poses itself as an efficient solution to the lack of foresight which intensifies the adversity of any natural disaster and the following emergency situation. This is exactly what the sensors concentrate on, by monitoring multiple climatic parameters. IoT sensors can be installed within a particular area to create a system that ultimately acts as an emergency unit in case of catastrophic events. Weather parameters, such as humidity, moisture, temperature, air quality, pressure, water level, and many more are constantly monitored by these sensors and the moment any one or more of them reach a dangerous level, the sensor network grasps it.

Any other notification system could hardly match up the speed of sensors notification, when it comes to alerting emergency responders and message broadcasters. Moreover, sensors contribute to the available data that provides the real-time details about weather, possible ways of evacuation, traffic, medical services, and police. They in a nutshell anticipate the upcoming hazards well in advance so as to help decisions regarding the next plan of action.

Sensors that are designed to predict flood situations through identification of possible critical hazards affecting infrastructure, have to be installed in a strategic manner. Flood depiction and management system can be complicated but if well planned and implemented, its versatility does an excellent job in flood-like events. Several IoT sensor network systems can efficiently function on an automated response solely on the basis of the real-time data absorbed by the sensors. In case of a forest fire, IoT sensors on trees monitor temperature, moisture, CO and CO2 levels. Local population is notified in advance and all the details are informed to firefighters even before they reach the location.

Researchers are further working on specific IoT sensor types, including infrared and microwave. While the former one may have its application in flood prediction and management, the latter one is foreseen to be a valuable sensor in case of earthquakes.

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