When an electronics engineer from Heriot-Watt University spent three nights caring for her unwell son, she was struck by an idea that could soon revolutionise healthcare for babies in the home.

Dr Rula Sharqi, a lecturer at the University’s Dubai campus, has co-developed what is believed to be the world’s first ‘smart baby wristband’ capable of round-the-clock monitoring of a child’s vital signs with the ability to send text alerts and, in extreme cases, raise the alarm with emergency services. 

She has spent the last 12 months working on the LittleGard project alongside fourth-year robotics engineering student, Nakhul Kalaivanan, who joined as part of his final year coursework.

After successfully building a working prototype, the pair are now willing to offer their idea for free to an industry partner with the capabilities of bringing the invention to market.

Dr Sharqi, an MIT-trained associate professor from the University’s School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, said: “We really believe in this product and its potential to save lives.

“Uncontrolled fevers account for the highest number of fatalities in infants so it’s a very serious problem.

“That’s why we are happy to give away our work for free to a company that has the knowledge and passion to bring this to market.”

Inspiration for the smart wristband came in 2018 when Dr Sharqi, a single-mother, was caring for her two-year-old son Joseph who was suffering from a fever.

Frequent trips to and from Joseph’s room to check his temperature left Dr Sharqi ‘drained and exhausted’.

She explains: “A baby’s fever often worsens at night because everyone’s body temperature naturally rises in the evening. This circadian rhythm, which regulates our body temperature throughout the day, causes temperatures to peak in the late afternoon and evening. As a result, any existing fever can seem more severe during these hours, making night-time monitoring particularly important for ensuring your baby’s well-being.

“But this can be exhausting for the parents, who often lose sleep.

“It was through my own terrible experience that I had the idea for a device capable of notifying me via text message, when my child’s temperature had risen beyond or below a safe level.”

The wristband monitors body temperature, oxygen levels and pulse rate through a sequence of advanced nano sensors. While similar products are available, the smart wristband is thought to be the first that can send monitoring alerts direct to parents, carers, medical professionals and emergency services. 

It is fixed to a baby’s skin using a rubber material similar to that found in an Apple watch, helping to provide accurate readings. It is also wireless and powered by a rechargeable battery that is expected to last around six-months between charges.

When vital readings breach a safe limit, an email and/or text is automatically sent to parents via an app. There is also the option to issue the same alert to a family doctor to ensure the health authorities receive real-time information in the event medical attention is required.

Nakhul Kalaivanan is in his final year studying for a BEng (Hons) in Robotics Autonomous and Interactive Systems. He said: “With our wristband design, there won’t be any false readings as the sensors are placed directly onto the skin.

“It’s also a safe option as the device is battery powered and won’t overheat. We have used advanced sensors incorporated into our design, and have built-in safeguards so that a message can always be sent in the event WiFi temporarily drops.

“Besides monitoring vital signs, this device has the unique feature of sending alarm SMS alerts to parents and even directly to 911 in case of emergencies. This ensures immediate response and support, providing an extra layer of security for the baby’s health and safety.”

Dr Sharqi’s mother was one of the first female engineering graduates in the Arab world.

Now, following in her footsteps, Dr Sharqi hopes her work at the University will empower other women to consider engineering as a career.

She said: “My mother inspired me to enter the field of engineering and specialise in teaching in the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences. Through being involved in projects, such as this one, I hope I can inspire the new generation to apply for an engineering degree.”

Hewlett Packard Enterprise and NVIDIA announced NVIDIA AI Computing by HPE, a portfolio of co-developed AI solutions and joint go-to-market integrations that enable enterprises to accelerate adoption of generative AI.

Among the portfolio’s key offerings is HPE Private Cloud AI, a first-of-its-kind solution that provides the deepest integration to date of NVIDIA AI computing, networking and software with HPE’s AI storage, compute and the HPE GreenLake cloud. The offering enables enterprises of every size to gain an energy-efficient, fast, and flexible path for sustainably developing and deploying generative AI applications. Powered by the new OpsRamp AI copilot that helps IT operations improve workload and IT efficiency, HPE Private Cloud AI includes a self-service cloud experience with full lifecycle management and is available in four right-sized configurations to support a broad range of AI workloads and use cases.

All NVIDIA AI Computing by HPE offerings and services will be available through a joint go-to-market strategy that spans sales teams and channel partners, training and a global network of system integrators — including Deloitte, HCLTech, Infosys, TCS and Wipro — that can help enterprises across a variety of industries run complex AI workloads.

Announced during the HPE Discover keynote by HPE President and CEO Antonio Neri, who was joined by NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang, NVIDIA AI Computing by HPE marks the expansion of a decades-long partnership and reflects the substantial commitment of time and resources from each company.

“Generative AI holds immense potential for enterprise transformation, but the complexities of fragmented AI technology contain too many risks and barriers that hamper large-scale enterprise adoption and can jeopardize a company’s most valuable asset – its proprietary data,” said Neri. “To unleash the immense potential of generative AI in the enterprise, HPE and NVIDIA co-developed a turnkey private cloud for AI that will enable enterprises to focus their resources on developing new AI use cases that can boost productivity and unlock new revenue streams”.

“Generative AI and accelerated computing are fueling a fundamental transformation as every industry races to join the industrial revolution,” said Huang. “Never before have NVIDIA and HPE integrated our technologies so deeply – combining the entire NVIDIA AI computing stack along with HPE’s private cloud technology – to equip enterprise clients and AI professionals with the most advanced computing infrastructure and services to expand the frontier of AI.”

HPE and NVIDIA co-developed Private Cloud AI portfolio

HPE Private Cloud AI delivers a unique, cloud-based experience to accelerate innovation and return on investment while managing enterprise risk from AI. The solution offers:

● Support for inference, fine-tuning and RAG AI workloads that utilize proprietary data.
● Enterprise control for data privacy, security, transparency, and governance requirements.
● Cloud experience with ITOps and AIOps capabilities to increase productivity.
● Fast path to consume flexibly to meet future AI opportunities and growth.
Curated AI and data software stack in HPE Private Cloud AI
The foundation of the AI and data software stack starts with the NVIDIA AI Enterprise software platform, which includes NVIDIA NIM inference microservices.
NVIDIA AI Enterprise accelerates data science pipelines and streamlines development and deployment of production-grade copilots and other GenAI applications. Included with NVIDIA AI Enterprise, NVIDIA NIM delivers easy-to-use microservices for optimized AI model inferencing offering a smooth transition from prototype to secure deployment of AI models in a variety of use cases.
Complementing NVIDIA AI Enterprise and NVIDIA NIM, HPE AI Essentials software delivers a ready to run set of curated AI and data foundation tools with a unified control plane that provide adaptable solutions, ongoing enterprise support, and trusted AI services, such as data and model compliance and extensible features that ensure AI pipelines are in compliance, explainable and reproducible throughout the AI lifecycle.
To deliver optimal performance for the AI and data software stack, HPE Private Cloud AI delivers a fully integrated AI infrastructure stack that includes NVIDIA Spectrum-X Ethernet networking, HPE GreenLake for File Storage and HPE ProLiant servers with support for NVIDIA L40S, NVIDIA H100 NVL Tensor Core GPUs and the NVIDIA GH200 NVL2 platform.
Cloud experience enabled by HPE GreenLake cloud
HPE Private Cloud AI offers a self-service cloud experience enabled by HPE GreenLake cloud. Through a single, platform-based control plane, HPE Greenlake cloud services provide manageability and observability to automate, orchestrate and manage endpoints, workloads, and data across hybrid environments. This includes sustainability metrics for workloads and endpoints.
HPE GreenLake cloud and OpsRamp AI infrastructure observability and copilot assistant
OpsRamp’s IT operations are integrated with HPE GreenLake cloud to deliver observability and AIOps to all HPE products and services. OpsRamp now provides observability for the end- to- end NVIDIA accelerated computing stack, including NVIDIA NIM and AI software, NVIDIA Tensor Core GPUs and AI clusters as well as NVIDIA Quantum InfiniBand and NVIDIA Spectrum Ethernet switches. IT administrators can gain insights to identify anomalies and monitor their AI infrastructure and workloads across hybrid, multi-cloud environments.
The new OpsRamp operations copilot utilizes NVIDIA’s accelerated computing platform to analyze large datasets for insights with a conversational assistant, boosting productivity for operations management. OpsRamp will also integrate with CrowdStrike APIs so customers can see a unified service map view of endpoint security across their entire infrastructure and applications.
Accelerate time to value with AI – expanded collaboration with global system integrators
To advance the time to value for enterprises to develop industry-focused AI solutions and use cases with clear business benefits, Deloitte, HCLTech, Infosys, TCS and WIPRO announced their support of the NVIDIA AI Computing by HPE portfolio and HPE Private Cloud AI as part of their strategic AI solutions and services.
HPE adds support for NVIDIA’s latest GPUs, CPUs and Superchips
● HPE Cray XD670 supports eight NVIDIA H200 NVL Tensor Core GPUs and is ideal for LLM builders.
● HPE ProLiant DL384 Gen12 server with NVIDIA GH200 NVL2 is ideal for LLM consumers using larger models or RAG.
● HPE ProLiant DL380a Gen12 server support for up to eight NVIDIA H200 NVL Tensor Core GPUs is ideal for LLM users looking for flexibility to scale their GenAI workloads.
● HPE will be time-to-market to support the NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 / NVL2, as well as the new NVIDIA Blackwell, NVIDIA Rubin and NVIDIA Vera architectures.
High-density file storage certified for NVIDIA DGX BasePOD and NVIDIA OVX systems
HPE GreenLake for File Storage has achieved NVIDIA DGX BasePOD certification and NVIDIA OVX™ storage validation, providing customers with a proven enterprise file storage solution for accelerating AI, GenAI and GPU-intensive workloads at scale. HPE will be a time-to-market partner on upcoming NVIDIA reference architecture storage certification programs.
Availability
● HPE Private Cloud AI is expected to be generally available in the fall.
● HPE ProLiant DL380a Gen12 server with NVIDIA H200 NVL Tensor Core GPUs is expected to be generally available in the fall.
● HPE ProLiant DL384 Gen12 server with dual NVIDIA GH200 NVL2 is expected to be generally available in the fall.
● HPE Cray XD670 server with NVIDIA H200 NVL is expected to be generally available in the summer.

The UAE’s Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications Office and Rittal FZE have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). This partnership aims to collaborate on various AI initiatives, enhance AI adoption and learning, and strengthen the robust digital infrastructure of the UAE through international joint efforts.

The MOU was signed by Saqr Binghalib, Executive Director of the UAE’s Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications Office, and Syed Tahir Nazir, Managing Director of Rittal FZE , during the AI Retreat 2024. This event, the largest of its kind, aims to accelerate AI application adoption and features participation from over 2,000 decision-makers, experts, and officials from both the government and private sectors. It was organized recently by the Dubai Center for AI Applications in collaboration with the National Program for Artificial Intelligence.

Saqr Binghalib emphasized that the UAE Government focuses on building skills and talents as a key element in the digital development journey and in creating a future based on intellect and creativity. He noted that Strengthening partnerships between the government and the private sector contributes to enhancing the country’s position as a global hub for the AI sector, reinforcing its active global role, and supporting the national strategies’ goals of building future competencies and equipping them with the necessary tools for development and advancing towards a future based on digital skills.

Syed Tahir Nazir, Managing Director, Rittal FZE said: “We are fully committed and support the vision of the Office of Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications during our discussion and agreed with Mr. Saqr Binghalib. Rittal FZE is committed to support capacity building, knowledge enhancement, and technology advancements through innovations in the field of AI and other smart applications, especially to support programming in the field of Robotics and Industry 4.0 system and applications along with supporting Green Technologies. Rittal continues its efforts for environmental protection and reducing carbon footprint with its innovative products and solutions through collaborations with government and public sectors to secure a better future for our communities and next generations. We are excited to be a partner of AI department and are looking forward to working with H.E Saqr Binghalib for a mutually successful collaboration.”

The agreement between the Office of Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications and Rittal, aims to achieve the objectives of the UAE Strategy for AI and its ambitious goals to support private sector initiatives, increase productivity, build a strong research and development base, and develop AI talents and skills. Additionally, it aims to enhance cooperation in various AI initiatives, and enrich and enhance the coding ecosystem and coding community in the UAE. This includes organizing training courses, discussions, and dialogues to develop coding skills and technological innovation among youth, experts, and enthusiasts. Furthermore, it aims to enhance collaboration and communication opportunities between leading technology companies and coders, contributing to driving digital transformation and building a better future.