Smart technology makes Chinese city "smarter"

CHANGSHA, April 19 (Xinhua) -- In an intensive care unit (ICU) in Changsha, the capital city of central China's Hunan Province, a computer is busy doing its work. However, there's something unusual about this usual-looking computer -- it can predict the patient's death risk.

Based on big data and artificial intelligence (AI), the Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University in Changsha developed a mortality risk prediction system.

"The system can tell us the patient's death risk one week later and analyze the influence factors of this risk, which helps us plan effective treatment and improve it more reasonably," said Yu Bo, an attending physician at the hospital.

Besides intelligent medical treatment, self-driving technology, intelligent logistics, intelligent hydraulic engineering, other cutting-edge tech are also gradually playing leading roles in the "smart city."

Changsha was the first in China to roll out a self-driving taxi service for the public in April last year. Users can hail the taxis using Baidu Maps in some selected areas in the city, covering residential communities, commercial areas, and industrial parks.

Logistics, a traditional industry, is also becoming more intelligent. Combining 5G, autonomous driving, and other high-tech, Changsha's Xiangjiang New Area and Sany Group will build "smart" transportation lines on urban roads and expressways to increase transportation efficiency and save fuel consumption.

Hunan enters the flood season in April every year. The water conservancy department makes full use of satellite remote sensing, video surveillance, and other technologies to build up a big data platform of intelligent hydraulic engineering, which can prevent floods more rapidly and precisely.

At the just-concluded opening ceremony of the 2021 Internet Yuelu Summit, experts believed that cities with a good manufacturing foundation like Changsha could take an intelligent "application scenario-driven" road.

Hong Fangming, president of Huawei Cloud in China, said at the ceremony that the new economy is inseparable from industrial upgrading. The digitalization and intelligent upgrading of R&D, production, and the supply chain would produce a vast market space.