Photos: Meet the first resident of the 'techno-flat'

A facility known as the intelligent dormitory 2 (iDorm2) has welcomed its first occupant, Liping Shen, an e-learning researcher from China. She has spent three months testing the flat's gadgets and seeing what it's like to live in the high-tech surroundings and is due to return to Shanghai later this month.

The iDorm2 is a two-bedroom flat developed by the Intelligent Inhabited Environments group, which is part of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Essex.

One of the first gizmos Liping tested was a digital picture frame which lets her see photos of her husband and two-year-old son Zhe in Shanghai. They can see images of Liping with another digital picture frame at home.

Liping is pictured above talking to her son using a webcam via the photo frame.