EAGER: RF Control of Biological Systems -- Bio-enabled Wireless Sensor Networks

Northeastern University, Boston MA

Investigators

Abstract

The medium-term goal of this project is to develop a Bio-enabled Sensor Network (BSN) composed of sensing devices that can enter a full sleep mode but still be woken up by a long-range RF signal. The idea is to transduce a weak Electro-Magnetic signal into biological signals and use a biological device to demodulate the information embedded in the EM signal. The short-term goal of this project is to develop a clear vision for the potential of biological communications and computation in the specific context of wireless sensor networks (WSN) and articulate a research path and preliminary answers to the following questions. What are the fundamental limits of EM energy harvesting? In the specific case of address recognition in WSN, what are the potential, means and limits of computation, communication, of a distributed network of biological processes? Beyond, the intra-node networked bio-communications and computation, the wake-up mechanism results in optimization problems because of its high delay and limited capacity. How can hybrid, biological and periodic, wake up mechanisms be combined to satisfy the system requirements? What is the viability of using biological organisms in WSNs? Research in biological and molecular communications and computation holds the promise to revolutionize and bridge the fields of computer science, biology, electrical engineering, and mechanical engineering. The PI aims at obtaining preliminary results, and assembling a cross-disciplinary team with expertise in computation, communication, networking, biology, and nano-mechanics, to write a full proposal with clear, focused, and realistic objectives to develop a prototype BSN.