I think I will stick with my original idea for a research idea which is ubiquitous computing. This concept is defined as computing that is involved anywhere all the time. It usually contains devices that intercommunicate and can be applied to all aspects of our lives. We’ve seen maybe a glimpse of what that can look like with modern technology, but the future of ubiquitous computing sure is intriguing. In my research, I plan on focusing more on ubicomp and how it can be applied to the health field. Ubiquitous computing is a very broad subject so I think narrowing it down to how it relates to one area of our life will make my research a bit easier.
Health and sports have always been a pretty big interest of mine. So I would say my primary question will be how will ubiquitous computing affect these areas and change our
lives in the future? More specifically what are the benefits we will get from it? and what are the potential downsides if there are any? There are some things I can picture like some sort of health device that you can wear that communicates with your phone to tell you your VO2 levels or blood pressure in real-time. The limits are truly endless though. Hopefully, I find an idea that I have never thought of. Another question I would like to find the answer to is how can technology improve performance in sports. I am currently taking a health and human performance class as an elective and we’ve learned about some really cool technologies used in the field. I can only imagine in the future what these will be and the kind of information it will give us about our bodies.
I have not done a lot of preliminary research on the topic. Everything I know about it is either of new headlines or from that HHP class that I mentioned. During one of the classes, we had a guest speaker who is a doctor. He showed us some videos and demonstrations
over this device that attached to whatever muscle you wanted to measure. Then you would do a workout targeting that muscle and it would show how much oxygen was being delivered to that specific muscle. I thought this was pretty neat and the effects a device like this could have over exercise science could be very beneficial. Also, I am sure most of you are familiar with Apple Watches or FitBits. They definitely do some levels of health monitoring, and some people rely on the very heavily for the information they provide. Although I don’t have a lot of past knowledge or experience in the subject, I am looking forward to diving in and learning more about it.
One database that I think I will use is the Applied Science & Technology Full-Text one. It has journals and articles over many different subjects that also involve informatics. I already tried typing in ubiquitous computing and health and a load of results showed up. Another database is the Information Science Collection, I did the same thing and there were about 70 results. Lastly I will use the Health and Medicine database. I had to go outside of the informatics databases and into the HHP ones, but I think it will also provide good insight.
I have always been interested in the use of technology in health care as well. There is some deep sci-fi need for the outrageous I think, but also the possibilities are endless! Just the other day I read an article about a wearable blood sugar patch that monitored a patients metrics and took away the need for constant finger pricks or macro logging. I think that this topic will have a huge list of results because of the research that is done to improve the way we care for people, not only in treatments but in preventative care. I would be curious what the private sector has to offer the big healthcare companies, much in the way Elon Musk retooled space travel, maybe there is someone working to design cutting edge healthcare tech. Of course, I do think sports is a great place to start looking for those things too, an athletes body is there livelihood and in turn those that employ them will likely want to develop cutting edge tech to ensure return on an investment. Can’t wait to see what you find!