Heritage Intelligence

Heritage Intelligence was a two year project (2008–10) that monitored cultural heritage environments with intelligent sensor systems

A closeup of a white circuitboard with colourful wires that sits on top of navy blue fabric

5 February 2010

Aims

Heritage Intelligence aimed develop an intelligent monitoring system for museums and historic buildings, or objects in transit, and for large outdoor heritage buildings and sites. The project built on wireless mesh sensor technology (a wireless, non-hierarchical, scalable and self organising sensor network) developed by Senceive Ltd.

Outcome

Heritage Intelligence integrated a range of chemical and physical sensors into a single "early warning" system. The sensors measured:

temperature
relative humidity
vibration
particulates
light (UV and visible)
volatile organic compounds
formaldehyde.

The remote and reliable gathering of data through the exploitation of very low energy consumption, self-powered, geographically distributed wireless mesh networks was another feature of the project development.

Each "node" in the network was small, cheap and robust and could both log data and act as a transmitter/receiver for data. Because of the technology involved, the system was very flexible - if a sensor or node failed the network could inform the user and the nodes could automatically reconfigure communication paths. The network could be accessed by a wired connection or wirelessly using GSM/GPRS.

The system was tested on a number of sites and in a number of applications. The crucial role of the heritage partners was to advise on the monitoring needs, to build intelligence into the system and to provide access to historic collections, buildings and sites.

The Heritage Intelligence System represented a true step change in cultural heritage monitoring and management.

Outputs

Key features of the Heritage Intelligence system:

Simple to install and configure with a highly accessible user interface and tools for management of the system
Self powered wireless nodes with a long operational life (including power scavenging technology)
Ability of the network to reconfigure itself and adapt as objects are relocated (or moved in transit) or sensors redeployed
Ability to support multiple sensors and sensor types in a single sensor node (e.g. temperature, relative humidity, light, pollutants and mechanical monitoring such as shock and tilt)
Built-in intelligence, so that the network can adapt measurement regimes, identify events and generate alerts.

The Heritage Intelligence System works on the basis of numerous wireless nodes communicating with each other and each carrying several sensors, as required. The number of possible configurations is unlimited.

Project partners

People

Matija Strlic

Funding

The Heritage Intelligence project was co-funded by UCL and the UK Technology Strategy Board.