Since the appearance of steam engines in the late 18th century, cities have been growing with the development of transportation and the consequent increase of its urban population and economic activities. Presently, cities accommodate more than half of the world population and are expected to be responsible for 73% of the world’s energy use in 2030. Cities come to the fore as a problem, being also the roots of solution for current environment and energy-related problems. The Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) and Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems applied in Latin American cities have shown the possibility of establishing efficient urban transport networks and sustainable urban structures at low cost. Meanwhile, Asian cities are anticipated to accommodate 54% of the world urban population by 2050. Sejong city, South Korea is the newest planned city in the region aiming to see its completion in 2030. The aim of this paper is to assess the future urban sustainability of Sejong city by analyzing first the Master Plan of the construction of the city in accordance with PEBOSCA (Physical, Economical, Biological, Organizational, Social, Cultural, and Aesthetical) resources, and second its implementation in general with a focus on the expected role of Transit-Oriented Development in particular looking at BRT. Putrajaya’s case is referred for anticipated shortcomings which Sejong should be prepared for. Secondary data and interpretations from books and articles regarding contemporary urban problems are comprehensively reviewed to systemically analyze the influences of implementation of TOD upon urban sustainability. This study revealed that planned actions derived from TOD will play an important role in resolving urban problems in Sejong city by relieving urban traffic congestion, CO2 emission and fossil fuel consumption. And systemic influences on improvement of business activities, government tax income, social activities and equity, and olfactory quality of the city are expected. Therefore, TOD is deemed to be a better option for existing cities and is necessary for newly developing planned cities in Asia and Africa.

Yes / This survey provides an insightful overview of recent advancements in facial recognition technology, mainly focusing on multi-modal face recognition and its applications in security biometrics and identity verification. Central to this study is the Sejong Face Database, among other prominent datasets, which facilitates the exploration of intricate aspects of facial recognition, including hidden and heterogeneous face recognition, cross-modality analysis, and thermal-visible face recognition. This paper delves into the challenges of accurately identifying faces under various conditions and disguises, emphasising its significance in security systems and sensitive sectors like banking. The survey highlights novel contributions such as using Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) to generate synthetic disguised faces, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) for feature extractions, and Fuzzy Extractors to integrate biometric verification with cryptographic security. The paper also discusses the impact of quantum computing on encryption techniques and the potential of post-quantum cryptographic methods to secure biometric systems. This survey is a critical resource for understanding current research and prospects in biometric authentication, balancing technological advancements with ethical and privacy concerns in an increasingly digital society. / European Union’s Horizon-Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)-RISE-2019-2023, Marie Skłodowska-Curie, Research, and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE), titled: Secure and Wireless Multimodal Biometric Scanning Device for Passenger Verification Targeting Land and Sea Border Control

Yes / Facial recognition technology is crucial for precise and rapid identity verification and security. This research delves into advancements in facial recognition technology for verification purposes, employing a combination of convolutional neural networks (CNNs), principal component analysis (PCA), and sequential neural networks. Unlike identification, our focus is on verifying an individual's identity, that is a critical distinction in the context of security applications. Our goal is to enhance the efficacy and precision of face verification using several imaging modalities, including thermal, infrared, visible light, and a combination of visible and infrared. We use the pre-trained VGG16 model on the ImageNet dataset to extract features. Feature extraction is performed using the pre-trained VGG16 model on the ImageNet dataset, complemented by PCA for dimensionality reduction. We introduce a novel method, termed VGG16-PCA-NN, aimed at improving the precision of facial authentication. This method is validated using the Sejong Face Database, with a 70% training, 15% testing, and 15% validation split. While demonstrating a remarkable approaching 100% accuracy rate across visual and thermal modalities and a combined visible-infrared modality, it is crucial to note that these results are specific to our dataset and methodology. A comparison with existing approaches highlights the innovative aspect of our work, though variations in datasets and evaluation metrics necessitate cautious interpretation of comparative performance. Our study makes significant contributions to the biometrics and security fields by developing a robust and efficient facial authentication method. This method is designed to overcome challenges posed by environmental variations and physical obstructions, thereby enhancing reliability and performance in diverse conditions. The realised accuracy rates that the approach achieves across a variety of modalities demonstrate its promise for applications that use multi-modal data. This opens the door for the creation of biometric identification systems that are more trustworthy and secure. It is intended that the technology will be used in real-time settings for which the new modalities can be integrated in different situations.