When a local disaster such as a fire occurs, it is difficult to know, in real time, the location of the disaster and information on road closures in the surrounding area. If disaster evacuees are not aware of the occurrence of a disaster and are seriously injured owing to evacuation delay, there is a high possibility that they will lose their lives. To solve this problem, we have proposed and are conducting research and development on the Emergency Rescue Evacuation Support System (ERESS). This system automatically detects disasters at an early stage by collecting sensor information from smartphones through an ad hoc network and provides necessary information to evacuees and evacuation support. We will introduce an overview of this system and examples of the research results we have conducted so far.

The demand for highly reliable remote control of devices such as robots through wireless communication has been increasing. This paper focuses on a wireless networked control system in which a single controller attempts to reliably control a single controlled target via wireless communication. In pursuit of establishing a dependable wireless networked control system, we expound on the integrated design method of communication and control systems considering the reliability of communications and control states.

Various objective evaluation criteria, such as image compression performance and processing speed, have been established for digital image processing results depending on the purpose. Conversely, objective evaluation methods related to human perception and sensitivity, such as visual comfort and aesthetic evaluation, are currently being developed. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct subjective evaluation, sensory evaluation, and psychophysical experiments to evaluate the results of image processing. However, if these experiments are not executed correctly, they may yield incorrect evaluation results; therefore, it is important to design and conduct appropriate experiments. In this paper, we summarize the key considerations when evaluating images involving human observers.