Written by Nicholas Faddis, Master of Science in Business Administration, Data Analytics Concentration
USI’s MINKA Learning Lab for Living Well contains a variety of smart home technology that can be used to aid aging in place. The robot mop and vacuum cleaner, bed sensors to control the lights and a touchless sink are a few examples of individual pieces of technology. While all these devices are beneficial on their own, USI’s CNHP has placed three tiers of artificial intelligence in the MINKA house to connect these units into a central controlling hub, allowing them to work simultaneously to provide more efficient and effective care.
The first of this technological trinity is Amazon’s Alexa, a cloud-based voice service who acts as a virtual assistant for the user. There are currently three Echo Dots and an Echo Show spread around the MINKA connected to each other. These Echo units control the mop, vacuum cleaner, television, and some of the lights in the house. They can also play music together.
The second artificial intelligence in the MINKA house is Josh, created by Josh.ai. It is a voice-controlled home automation system, similar to Alexa, that provides a plethora of additional features of its own. Josh has superior Natural Language Processing capability, which allows for pattern recognition to adapt to the user over time. This also lets Josh better understand everyday sentences and phrases while also being able to perform multiple tasks at once. It is connected to the fan, lights, bedroom shades, thermostat, front door camera (Ring) and more within the MINKA house.
The third piece is a little different from the others. For this technology, USI collaborated with private contractor Ty Seddon to create Joi, a voice-activated virtual assistant intended to improve the emotional well-being and feeling of independence of people living with dementia. Joi has two main functions: displaying photos and playing music. The concept behind both of these functions was to create “joy pops” for those living with dementia to remind them of the past and keep their minds and body active. A caretaker can set and adjust both a specific photo album to be displayed as well as a music playlist to listen to for the MINKA’s inhabitant. There is a camera attached that follows the user's movements and is recorded in a final report when the session of songs is finished. Joi can also start a conversation with the user once a picture is shown on the screen. This allows the viewer to discuss the relevance of the picture to the user’s life and remember when that picture was taken.
Technology is ever changing, which means that USI is regularly adding new technological tools to the MINKA house. You can learn more about the MINKA by viewing this video, or you can keep up to date with the MINKA’s webpage.
