Cyber Physical Systems for Intelligent Disaster Response Networks: Conceptual Proposal and Field Experiment

After large-scale natural disasters, such as the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, the demand for communication increases and continuously changes due to fluctuating environmental factors and demand from people, seeking to confirm the safety of others and intending to organize forces to react to the disaster situation. However, it is likely that reaching the communication service is difficult because the communication infrastructure may be damaged or out of use. To provide information communication technology (ICT) services in such circumstances, we propose an ICT system with intelligence, which can adapt to continuously changing conditions in disaster situations. This system is realized by the implementation of the cyber physical system (CPS) to networks, and we explain its capabilities to provide ICT services in disaster situations. Moreover, we explain the field experiment in which we constructed a CPS-equipped network in the Philippines. The successful results demonstrate the effectiveness and the feasibility of disaster-resilient CPS.