Technology: “Smart node” paves the way for urban interactivity

A meeting place where it’s possible to exchange ideas, create and share creative contents, navigate and get updated on the activities of the city by means of the new web technologies of the cloud computing. It’s the Smart node, an interactive urban installation developed by ENEA as part of the project “City 2.0”, funded by the Ministry of Education, University and Research with the objective of finding solutions to improve the efficiency of urban services like lighting and public buildings, sustainable mobility and air quality monitoring.

Installed at the Smart Village in the ENEA Casaccia Research Center, it will soon become its technological and gathering heart with the possibility of receiving and sharing information, photos and videos as in a virtual square in a city of a not too far future.

The Smart node is shaped in the form of three different spatial domains equipped with software applications developed by ENEA experts: “Creative swarm” dedicated to creative development of new contents which, thanks to the multitouch screen interface, enables multiple users to navigate in the database by simply touching keywords on the screen; “Community exhibition”, where contents are shown according to playlists already set up, also with dedicated exhibitions; “City sense”, monitoring in real time the community through 5 live monitors with social media and a web portal.

The Smart node was one of the most successful tours during the recently held ENEA Research Open Day and will be experimented as an essential part of the future city for promoting the active participation of citizens and ricreate a social identity, a sense of belonging and memory. “The Smart node is a concrete step in the roadmap to the smart city, with the aim of increasingly shaping  the city on people’s needs, for meeting the need of on demand resources thanks to the flexibility of its services. It’s a place welcoming the citizen but at the same time takes him to other places, both virtual-like the network-and physical-like the city”, Claudia Meloni, at the ENEA Smart Energy Division pointed out.

Designed by “4M Engineering” and developed by “Steel Living”, young italian companies, Smart Node is the physical part of the Social urban Network (SUN), a technological infrastructure combining virtual components on the web (social network, portal and app) and interactive installations and actual events in the neighbourhood to promote interaction among users and their sense of belonging to the community. A huge database collecting contents from the web, Facebook and Twitter, making them available through web service and other remote applications.

For more information please contact:

Mauro Annunziato, ENEA -Head Smart Energy Division, mauro.annunziato@enea.it

Claudia Meloni, ENEA – Smart Energy Division, claudia.meloni@enea.it