SMART Cities Research Cluster

Overview

The University of Memphis and the City of Memphis are partnering on a SMART City Initiative (as part of a larger national-level MetroLab Network program) to address the needs of Memphis citizens utilizing emerging technologies and innovations arising from research at the University of Memphis. A key focus is on research, development, and deployment (RD&D) projects that offer technological and analytically-based solutions to challenges facing urban areas including inequality in income, health, mobility, security and opportunity; aging infrastructure; and environmental sustainability and resiliency. City-university research and innovation projects help position the university as the city's R&D partner and the city as a test-bed for U of M research. Projects are designed to present an opportunity to scale effective solutions, accelerate best practices, and advance the understanding of urban science.

Targeted Areas of Research 

The City of Memphis under the leadership of Mayor Jim Strickland has identified four key areas of concentration for which research proposals are being sought:

· Crime
· Litter
· Blight
· Efficient Government

The research focuses on work that:

1) exhibit direct positive impact on the citizens of Memphis

2) contextualize smart city innovation in the wider emerging technologies context, and

3) are efficiently and effectively implementable by the City.

Cluster researchers are partnered with City leaders to implement their research ideas and present their research to a wider national audience.