EPSCoR Research Fellows: NSF: Advancing Multi-Sensor Smart Environments Without Human-Machine Interaction for Individuals with Functional Limitations

This Research Infrastructure Improvement EPSCoR Research Fellows project provides a fellowship to an Assistant Professor and training for a graduate student at Montana Technological University. This work is conducted in collaboration with Dr. Milad Roohi at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Through the fellowship, the PI will develop a privacy-preserving, autonomous monitoring system that uses floor vibration, radar, and environmental sensors to detect mobility changes and identify distress events in individuals with functional impairments. The project integrates the areas of civil engineering, data science, and biomedical sensing to advance smart home accessibility and reduce reliance on manual or voice-based interactions. The award will also strengthen collaborative research capacity, expand student engagement in assistive technology design, and contribute to the development of user-adaptive, human-centered infrastructure solutions.

This project will develop a real-time, autonomous monitoring system for smart home environments that will detect mobility changes and distress events in individuals with functional impairments. The intellectual contribution will be the creation of a multilevel, nonlinear state estimation model that will fuse data from floor vibration, radar, and environmental sensors to infer activity patterns without requiring user interaction. The methodology will include multi-sensor data acquisition, signal enhancement, and the development and implementation of a predictive algorithm that will generate safety alerts based on deviations from expected mobility states. The project will enhance research infrastructure by supporting faculty advancement in sensor fusion and state estimation modeling, providing hands-on training opportunities for a graduate student, and strengthening collaborative capacity between Montana Tech and the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Research activities will be integrated with curriculum development, student mentoring, and broader institutional efforts to grow human-centered infrastructure research, ultimately advancing workforce development in assistive technologies and smart systems design. This project is supported by the EPSCoR Research Infrastructure Improvement Program: EPSCoR Research Fellows, which supports early- and mid-career investigators in eligible jurisdictions to develop collaborations at the nation’s private, government or academic research institutions.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Award Number: 2531622
Principal Investigator: Yohanna Mejia Cruz
Funds Obligated: $224,110
State: MT