Human at Home: towards a human and intelligent habitat

How can technology improve our living conditions? How will we interact with "intelligent" housing? What information can and should be shared? What future legislative framework for this data? Supported by the CNRS, the University of Montpellier and Paul Valéry Montpellier 3 University, the HUman at home projecT (HUT) project is looking into these questions thanks to an inhabited "apartment-observatory" since October 2018.

(original video presentation of the HUT project)

volunteer co-HUTeurs

In the fall of 2018, two student volunteers moved into an "observatory apartment", the study ground for some sixty researchers. Lawyers, economists, electronics engineers, computer scientists, architects, specialists in language and behavioral sciences, marketing or health... the questions they ask can only be explored in a relevant way by studying a permanent living space. If they don't set foot on site, the researchers exploit the precious data produced by the "co-HUTeurs".

In concrete terms, floor pressure sensors and motion sensors in certain rooms are used to assess the movements and gestures of occupants in their living environment. This information can be of interest both to architects (to identify any areas avoided by occupants, and optimize layout) and to health professionals (as movements and postures can be markers of well-being or ill-being). Sensors for pollution, closet and window opening, water and electricity consumption, etc., can be used to devise new services.
Linguists and cognitive scientists are studying how occupants interact with so-called "intelligent" systems. Research on the sensors themselves, for example, is aimed at making them energy self-sufficient (energy harvesting).

Research is also focusing on the management of data produced by connected objects - both technically (how to organize these "data lakes") and ethically and legally. An independent ethics committee has been set up to protect the privacy of "co-HUTeurs". Its role is to examine all scientific projects, and it can be called upon at any time by local residents and researchers, or can act on its own initiative.

To design this apartment, the consortium benefited from a modular platform at the Maison des sciences de l'Homme Sud. It can be converted into different rooms of a dwelling, enabling daily experiments to be carried out in parallel with the long-term experiments conducted in the apartment-observatory.
The first occupants left the apartment in summer 2019. The apartment was then "reformatted" in line with the initial results and new avenues of research, before being offered again free of charge to two other student volunteers.

Become a CoHUTeur and experience the connected home of tomorrow!

To apply, all you need to do is be enrolled in a Bachelor's, Master's or PhD program in Montpellier; be a volunteer, motivated by the project, whether or not you're interested in technology; agree to produce/share data on a daily basis as part of the project, to be used only by researchers and project members.

• Fill in the application form before May 21, 2021.

First, we'll analyze your application. Then, if you are pre-selected, you will take part in a second stage of meetings and exchanges in June, to join this innovative and experimental shared apartment scheme.

Finally, the results will be communicated to the selected coHUTeurs at the beginning of July. Moving into the apartment will be possible from October 1.

At the crossroads of disciplines

This research project brings together a consortium of one local authority (Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole), seven companies (Delided, EDF, Nexity, Oceasoft, SensDigital, Synox, Weda) and a dance association with an artistic research-creation project ("Comme ça"), alongside the Maison des sciences de l'Homme Sud and 12 laboratories:

• Dynamiques du droit (CNRS/Université de Montpellier);
• Muscular Dynamics and Metabolism (Inra/University of Montpellier);
• Epsylon (University of Montpellier/Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3);
• Espace-Dev (IRD/Université de Montpellier/Université des Antilles/Université de Guyane/Université de la Réunion);
• EuroMov (University of Montpellier);
• Institute of Electronics and Systems (CNRS/University of Montpellier);
• Computer and Production Engineering Laboratory (IMT Mines d'Alès);
• Montpellier Laboratory of Computer Science, Robotics and Microelectronics (CNRS/Université de Montpellier);
• Innovation, forms, architectures, environments laboratory (French Ministry of Culture);
• Montpellier recherche en économie (University of Montpellier);
• Montpellier management research (University of Montpellier);
• Praxiling (CNRS/Université Paul Valéry Montpellier 3).

The project was supported by the Maison des sciences de l'Homme Sud, the CNRS Mission pour l'interdisciplinarité and Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole.