One Day Workshop -  Dublin City University

Friday 30th June, 2006

hosted by the

 

 

In recent years, there have been tremendous advances in the development of low power platforms that integrate signal acquisition from sensing devices with localised signal conditioning, storage, and wireless communications via wireless communications in a compact, low power platform. These platforms, or ‘motes’, are the basic building blocks of wireless sensor networks. However, the deployment of large numbers of wireless sensor networks remains an elusive objective, with relatively few convincing demonstrator deployments of over 100 motes. Critical issues inhibiting progress are:

• The need to provide sufficient energy to enable large numbers of motes to continue functioning autonomously for years, as the servicing of sensor networks rapidly becomes impractical as the numbers involved as scaled up.
• The need for materials that provide more effect routes to harvest energy from the environment, and materials that are much more energy efficient in performing critical tasks such as sensing, actuating and communicating.
 

In this one-day workshop, these issues will be examined and discussed by an invited panel of international speakers drawn from industry and academia.

Workshop attendees will  also be registered to hear a plenary lecture given by Nobel Laureate Prof. Alan MacDiarmid, University of Pennsylvania and University of Texas at Dallas, USA, entitled ‘Harvesting Solar Energy to Produce Electricity or to Produce Organic Compounds: Which Way to Go?'.  Professor MacDiarmid received his Nobel prize for pioneering work in conducting polymers.  His recent work on materials for energy harvesting will be critical for the development of futuristic motes capable of functioning completely autonomously for indefinite periods of time.   

This is a rare opportunity to hear Prof. MacDiarmid speak and is not to be missed!

 

Programme Professor Eugene Kennedy, Dublin City University, Ireland:  Welcome Professor Paddy Nixon, University College Dublin, Ireland:  ‘Energy Optimisation in WSNs’ Professor Dermot Diamond, Dublin City University, Ireland:  ‘Energy Consumption Issues in Chemo/Biosensing using WSNs’ Professor Gordon Wallace, University of Wollongong, Australia:  ‘The Role of New Materials for Sensing and Energy Storage’ Professor David Officer, Massey University, New Zealand: 'Energy Harvesting at the Molecular Level' Dr. Cian O’Mathuna, Tyndall Institute, Ireland:  'Energy Scavenging for Long-Term Deployable Mote Networks' Professor Joe Paradiso, MIT Media Lab, USA: 'Energy Harvesting for Mobile Systems' Ben Hurley, CEO of technology firm Innovada and Chairman of WiSen: 'Strategy in Ireland for SME, MNC and Academic Teams in Realisation of WSN deployments' Dr. Benjamin R. Mattes, Santa Fe Science and Technology, USA: 'Conducting Polymer Films and Fibers for Energy Storage and Optical Switching' Dr. Terrance J. Dishongh, Intel: 'Applications of Wireless Network Sensors to an Aging Population'   Plenary Lecture Nobel Laureate Professor Alan MacDiarmid 'Harvesting Solar Energy to Produce Electricity or to Produce Organic Compounds: Which way to go?'

Registration: Workshop registration is €100 (€50 student). Please see the link above for the Registration Page. There is no charge for Professor MacDiarmid’s lecture, but those wishing to attend must register in advance. As places will be limited, priority will be given to workshop attendees.