Wireless sensors extend reach of Internet into the real world

Text Source: Wireless sensors extend reach of Internet into the real world. by Alicia Chang, The Associated Press. USA TODAY.


LOS ANGELES — To the untrained eye, the sleek, airy building constructed atop a decommissioned nuclear reactor at the University of California at Los Angeles could pass for high-tech office space.

A closer inspection of the glass-and-steel facade reveals dozens of miniature, low-resolution cameras and sensors. They're wirelessly linked to computers throughout the 6,000-square-foot space, keeping tabs on traffic flow in public areas and monitoring temperature, humidity and acoustics.

The building serves as a testing ground for developing and perfecting wireless sensing technology to connect major chunks of the real world to the Internet. Such networks could monitor the environment for pollutants, gauge whether structures are at risk of collapse or remotely follow medical patients in real time.

"I see this as the next wave of extending the Internet into the physical world," said computer scientist Deborah Estrin, who heads the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing, a UCLA-based consortium of six schools.

Read the full article at USATODAY