The VALIDATE Accelerator FloodSense team, led by Florida Atlantic University’s Dr. Georgios Sklivanitis, Dan Zimmerman, and team member Aishwarya Jawne, is working to revolutionize flood sensing and prediction.
They aim to make significant contributions to climate studies, emergency management, urban planning, insurance processes, and more through hyperlocal sensors combining advanced artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) algorithms.
FloodSense received support from the Center for Smart Streetscapes Accelerator program which partners with the Columbia Lab-to-Market Accelerator Network in teaching students and faculty how to use their research to start companies.
The 2025 application cycle is open now, inviting undergraduates, graduates, postdocs, faculty, and alumni from every CS3 institution to participate. Find the application form here.
At the 2024 CS3 Innovation Summit, FloodSense was awarded $10,000 to continue their efforts to conduct customer discovery and prototyping. Completion of the 2025 cohort of the Accelerator program also makes teams eligible for the National Science Foundation (NSF)’s I-Corps Teams program, which may include up to $50,000 in grant funding.
The Sense of Innovation
FloodSense is currently building flood sensors for their upcoming pilot deployment in Broward County, Florida.
For the pilot deployment, Zimmerman is leading two teams of FAU undergraduate seniors to develop nine sensors.
One of the teams is redesigning solar-powered sensors to consolidate the design, while the other team is working on the data pipeline and anomaly detection.
The sensors are self-contained and do not require power or connectivity from the County, yet partnering with the County is essential. FloodSense is currently working with Broward County to identify how and where to take the next step of deployment.
Their pilot partners in Broward County are Chief Resilience Officer and Deputy Department Director Dr. Jennifer Jurado, and Assistant Chief Resilience Officer Dr. Gregory J. Mount.
After completing their deployment in Broward County, FloodSense looks to expand their product to help communities make strides in flood sensing and prediction.