Research Area:
Mobile and Ubiquitous Computing
Description
Recent years have witnessed a dramatic trend towards ubiquitous computing, whereby very large numbers of casually accessible, mobile or embedded computing devices are connected to an increasingly ubiquitous networking infrastructure. In this context, our research explores a host of data and resource management challenges in newly emerging networked systems, such as sensor networks, mobile ad hoc networks, and Internet-scale information systems. Specific projects include profile-based data management; broadcast disks; data recharging; mobile computers (with ad hoc networking) as note-taking, annotation, and collaboration tools; decentralized replication for mobile and weakly connected environments; and adaptive data dissemination in wireless sensor networks.
Another research area related to ubiquitous computing is the area of visual sensor networks (VSNs), which are composed of very large numbers of audio/visual sensors -- smart cameras -- distributed over a geographic area. The smart cameras coordinate their sensing, communication, and computation in order to acquire relevant information about their environment and to collaborate on high-level tasks. Applications of wired and wireless VSNs include surveillance and security in large public places, human-computer interaction, and smart living environments. Problems we are addressing in this area include: implementation of VSNs using low-cost off-the-shelf components; the design and fabrication of smart cameras with system-on-chip (SoC) embedded processors, reconfigurable hardware, and open operating system software; the design of optimized low-power real-time data-processing algorithms at the hardware level; software support for low-level image processing and networking operations at the embedded operating system level, including new image-based routing protocols; new collaborative real-time audio/visual processing algorithms; and the development of software models and supporting infrastructure to let users specify how sensor data should be processed, while letting our intelligent algorithms optimize where such processing occurs.
Faculty
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