Researchers aim to use humans as wireless nodes
1 min read
Sensors carried by members of the public could form the backbone of an ultra high bandwidth mobile internet infrastructure - and reduce the density of mobile phone base stations – according to researchers at Queen's University Belfast's Institute of Electronics, Communications and Information Technology (ECIT). Potential applications include remote healthcare monitoring where compact sensors implanted or worn on a patient's body are used to transmit information about their condition wirelessly.
Dr Simon Cotton of ECIT's wireless communications research group has been awarded a five year Research Fellowship by the Royal Academy of Engineering jointly with the Engineering and Physical Research Council (EPSRC) to examine how the technology can be harnessed to become part of everyday life.
One of the project's key goals is to investigate how small sensors carried by members of the public - in next generation smartphones, for example - could intercommunicate with each other and with others embedded in the surrounding infrastructure to create potentially vast body-to-body networks (BBNs).
According to Cotton, the sensors would interact to transmit data to provide 'anytime, anywhere' mobile network connectivity and they could pave the way for truly mobile cloud computing. They could also be configured to collaborate collectively in much the same way that the BiTtorrent peer-to-peer file sharing protocol allows the rapid transfer of huge amounts of information by distributing the huge computing power required across multiple users. This would enable the network to provide a range of ultra high bandwidth capabilities such as the streaming of high definition video to handheld devices.
If the idea takes off, BBNs could lead to a reduction in the number of base stations needed to service mobile phone users, particularly in areas of high population density. And they would also be more environmentally friendly as they have much lower power requirements than current networks.
Dr Cotton said: "Our work involves collaborating with national and international academic, industrial and institutional experts to develop a range of models for wireless channels required for 'body centric' communications. These will provide a basis for the development of the antennas, wireless devices and networking standards required to make BBNs a reality.
"Success in this field will not only bring major social benefits it could also bring significant commercial rewards for those involved. Even though the market for wearable wireless sensors is still in its infancy, it is expected to grow to more than 400million devices annually by 2014."
