Crossbow Announces IMB400 Imote2 Multimedia Board

Building on its popular Imote2 advanced wireless sensor platform, Crossbow Technology announced the new Imote2 Multimedia Board (IMB400), an integrated camera sensor board that simplifies the capture of rich media content for wireless sensor network applications. The IMB400 board adds rich media capabilities to wireless sensor platforms. 

Ralph Kling, Chief Architect for Crossbow Technology said “For the first time visual and audio data can be easily added to wireless sensor applications. This opens up new possibilities for wireless sensor applications, including for example, surveillance, machine vision, object tracking, animal behavior surveys, and elder care monitoring in locations and environments that would otherwise be too costly to observe with traditional monitoring systems.”

The Imote2 Multimedia Board offers a compact, power efficient solution due to its integration of camera, audio and motion detection functionality into one platform. The built-in camera can handle high-quality images with resolutions up to 640x480 pixels and 30 fps, along with audio at sampling rates of up to 48kHz.
Instead of using compute intensive image analysis to detect motion, the IMB400 uses a Passive InfraRed (PIR) sensor to pick up movement, which then activates the camera allowing for its operation as a low power device. These images can subsequently be stored, locally processed and transmitted with accompanying sound.

In addition to the PIR sensor, key subsystems include a color image and video camera chip along with an audio capture and playback CODEC. The board is supported under TinyOS, with future support planned for Linux, SOS and the Microsoft .NET Micro Framework. For more information and to order this exciting new platform, visit Crossbow's site here.

Interface your OWN sensors to eKo!

Crossbow's new eKo system has not only brought wireless sensor networks into the heart of precision agriculture, the system now also offers a quick and easy solution for anyone wanting to incorporate wireless sensor networks into their own outdoor monitoring solution. Whether they are looking to use eKo for environmental monitoring and research, urban monitoring, pollution detection, etc., this system is on its way to being the wireless sensor networking solution for any outdoor sensing requirement regardless of sensor type. eKo is fully packaged for the elements, solar-powered and ready to use out-of-the-box. This platform now provides users with a solution that requires little effort for complete customization with the new ESB developer's kit. The first phase of this kit has now been released to all eKo users.

eKo nodes (EN2100) can interface to many different types of sensors. Each of the node’s four sensor ports has a 6-pin connector that programmably interfaces to either analog or digital sensors, and each port has the ability to support two different sensors. Crossbow has created a standard interface (ESB: Environmental Sensor Bus) to communicate with a wide variety of sensors through these ports. 

Phase 1 of Crossbow's ESB developer’s kit allows users to interface their own simple analog sensors that do not require any additional signal or power conditioning to the eKo node. Users will only need to program the self-identification EEPROM and wire the sensors to the connector. The EEPROM embedded in the sensor’s connector is read by the port during power-up, and this information tells the node how to communicate with the sensor and contains parameters such as the required operating voltage and power-up time. After the information is read, the node programmably changes the pins according to the ESB requirements.  To request details on using Phase 1 of the ESB Developer's kit with your eKo system, visit Crossbow's site here.

Phase 2 of this kit release will support simple analog sensors requiring additional signal conditioning and/or power conditioning. These sensors use the external interface circuit between the eKo node and the sensor. The self-identification EEPROM is embedded in the Switchcraft connector.

Phase 3 will provide support for complex digital sensors that require signal conditioning, power boost or intelligent communication. These sensors use an external interface circuit between the eKo node and the sensor. They do not require that the EEPROM is embedded in the cable as the self-identification information is contained in the microprocessor. 

As an example of interfacing a simple sensor to eKo, Crossbow has recently integrated the MaxBotix MaxSonar range finder along with an air temperature sensor on the same connector.  The MaxSonar is an accurate, very low cost, ultra-sonic range finder that can run directly from the eKo battery supply at very low current. Also, of interest is to measure the ambient air temperature at the same time. Both of these sensors can be wired to a single eKo port connector.

The entire assembly can easily be mounted in PVC pipe fixtures for outdoor deployment. Once the two sensors are wired a Dallas DS2431 1Wire EEPROM is mounted into the sensor Switchcraft connector. Finally the EEPROM is programmed with the self-identification information. This is done using a programming board and PC program from Dallas Semiconductor. A mating Switchcraft connector is wired to the board to allow the sensor cable to be attached directly and the EEPROM then programmed.

The simplicity of integrating unique sensors with eKo, a fully packaged ready-to-use outdoor wireless monitoring device, enables users to deploy wireless sensor networks quickly, easily and effectively in a way they never have before. To request details on Phase 1 of the ESB Developer's kit, visit Crossbow's site here.

The State of Wireless Sensor Networks

The continuous size and cost reduction of electronic devices is gradually making the vision of ubiquitous wireless sensors networks a reality. After almost a decade of extensive research, Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are in the midst of the transition towards industrial deployment in various application domains such as automotive, environmental monitoring, health care, energy management, and building and industrial automation. BAIA presents a panel of outstanding experts from the academia and the industry who have played an essential role in the history and development of WSNs, including Crossbow's President/CEO, Mike Horton.

BAIA has organized an outstanding panel that will explore the state of wireless sensor networks on the evening of October 8th at UC Berkeley. Panelists include:

• Prof. David Culler, UC Berkeley, CTO and Co-Founder Arch Rock
• Mike Horton, CEO and Co-Founder Crossbow
• Prof. Raju Pandey, UC Davis, CTO and Co-Founder Synapsense
• Prof. Kris Pister, UC Berkeley, CTO and Co-Founder Dust Networks
• Dr. Joe Polastre, CTO and Co-Founder Sentilla
• Prof. Alberto Sangiovanni-Vincentelli, UC Berkeley, CTA and Co-Founder Cadence Design Systems

Questions addressed will include:

- What applications will drive the mass deployment of WSNs both in the short and in the long term?
- What players will be most successful in the WSN domain and what business model will they adopt?
- What are the main barriers before wide adoption of WSNs?
- When will the deployment of WSNs happen in large volumes?

The event is free, but limited to 100 attendees. Learn more and register here.

San Francisco Chronicle Features Crossbow's eKo System

Crossbow's eKo system has triggered an agricultural revolution in the world of precision agriculture and environmental monitoring. This cutting edge system was recently featured in the San Francisco Chronicle and the story can be viewed here.

(08-31) 15:50 PDT -- On a rolling hillside planted with row upon row of Cabernet grapes, viticulturist Jason Cole waxes eloquent about the elusive notion of 'terroir,' a term French farmers use to describe the 'je ne sais quoi' of crops harvested in any given locale.

"Grapes, chocolates, coffee, these are all incredibly good at soaking up their environments and spitting them out in their fruits," said Cole, who oversees the preening and pampering of more than 500 acres of vines planted at the Stagecoach Vineyard in Napa County.

That vineyard is a test bed for a new wireless sensing technology that measures soil wetness, wind speed, temperature and humidity to take the statistical pulse of the vineyard's microclimates to help determine how often and how much to irrigate. The system being tested at Stagecoach was developed by Crossbow Technology, a privately held, 90-person San Jose company that has created inertial guidance sensors for the aviation industry and researched the use of wireless sensor networks for the federal Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Other manufacturers of microclimate sensing systems include the Austrian company Adcon Telemetry, as well as Ranch Systems of Novato and Grape Networks of San Ramon.

The sensors that Cole is using at Stagecoach Vineyard represent one manifestation of a broader phenomenon called precision agriculture - the attempt to tailor the cultivation of large stretches of land so that the smallest possible subsection of a farm gets special but automated attention. In the Midwest, with its amber waves of grain, precision agriculture has been synonymous with huge tractors equipped with global positioning systems to keep the rows straight, for instance. But in California, the land of fruits, nuts and other specialty crops, precision agriculture has been expressed in technologies such as Cole's efforts to use wireless sensors to compute 'terroir.'

"The way that growers for many years decided whether it was time to water was they stuck their thumb in the ground," said Robert Robinson, vice president for Crossbow's wireless sensor division.

The basic field kit that Crossbow released earlier this year, priced at $3,359, consists of three sensing nodes that feed data collected in the field through an electronic gateway into what is essentially a Web page that can be viewed from any Internet-connected device. Crossbow says that basic configuration can divine the microclimate of sites as varied as a 4-acre plot of land in hilly and varied terrains such as Napa and 20 acres in the flatter, homogeneous Central Valley. Additional kits can extend the sensing network, wirelessly and indefinitely, over hill and dale.

Moisture sensors
Kneeling alongside a vine at Stagecoach Vineyard, Cole explained how the system, in addition to measuring temperature and humidity with above-ground sensors, sticks a virtual thumb deep into the soil in the form of two moisture sensors, one at a depth of 1 foot and the other at 3 feet.



"The whole point is to monitor what the roots are experiencing," Cole said. "Watering grapes is one of the most important factors to wine quality. You want to stress the vines in order to condense the flavor into smaller berries."

UC Davis Professor Stu Pettygrove, a soil specialist who has tracked precision agriculture in California, said the water-sensitivity of wine grapes, coupled with their high value relative to other agriculture products, make them a good candidate for this high-tech approach. But how many other California crops fit that description? Pistachios were the only other example Pettygrove offered. He said water-stinginess at just the right point helps burst the shells, making pistachios easy to eat.

Tree crops experiment
Professor Michael Delwiche, chairman of biological and cultural engineering at UC Davis, has experimented with wireless sensing systems that precisely apply water - sometimes mixed with chemical fertilizers in a process called fertigation - to tree crops like nectarines. So far, however, the cost benefit is not there in production orchards, he said.

Delwiche said wireless sensing systems and precision watering might find a home in commercial nurseries and flower-growing greenhouses, where the impetus is not purely economic - as measured by greater crop value - so much as it is regulatory. "They are under environmental regulation not to have runoff from the nursery location," Delwiche said. Eventually, manufacturers will try to improve the performance and bring down costs to encourage broader adoption of wireless sensing systems, he said. Meanwhile, the technology remains economical in niche markets - or exceptionally arid locales.

"In Israel, where water is so dear and they have the technological infrastructure, they're doing a lot of work in this area," Delwiche said. But at Stagecoach Vineyard, where cachet is central to the business plan, the cost of wireless sensing technology is hardly a barrier to the pursuit of quality.

"We're trying to grasp the 'terroir', but you'll always be grasping, you'll never have it all," Cole said.

For more information on the eKo system, visit the eKo site here.

Extending Our Senses into the Physical World

The picture of a future with wireless sensor networks-webs of sensory devices that function without a central infrastructure--is quickly coming into sharper focus through the work of Los Alamos National Laboratory computer scientist Sami Ayyorgun. Using Crossbow's TelosB Motes in their research, proponents of this new technology see a world with deployments to improve a wide range of operations.

Engineers could wirelessly monitor miles of gas and oil pipelines stretching across arid land for ruptures, damage, and tampering. Rescue workers might detect signs of life under the rubble of a collapsed building after an earthquake, thanks to a network of sensors inside the structure. Armed forces could keep an eye on a combat zone or a vast international border via a sensor network that could promptly provide alerts of any intrusion or illicit trafficking.

"It's not easy to envision the impacts that sensor networks will make, both socially and economically," Ayyorgun said. "Like many other researchers, I think they are likely to rival the impact that the Internet has made on our lives."

Ayyrogun has developed a new communication scheme that brings the reality of these and other applications a step closer. He has shown for the first time that concurrent gains in many measures of performance are possible, including connectivity, energy, delay, throughput, system longevity, coverage, and security.

In recognition of the multifaceted improvements Ayyorgun's research makes on state-of-the-art technology in this field, his recent paper, "Towards a Self-organizing Stochastic-Communications Paradigm for Wireless Ad-hoc/Sensor Networks," has been nominated for the Best-Paper Award from a pool of more than 250 manuscripts at the International Conference on Mobile Ad-hoc and Sensor Systems (MASS) of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Ayyorgun will present the paper at this prestigious meeting of the IEEE beginning September 29, in Atlanta, Georgia.

Like cell phones, wireless sensor networks depend on small, independently powered devices, often called motes, to communicate. But unlike cell phones, which always relay their signal through a base station such as a tower, multihop sensor motes use each other to relay signals, transmitting communiqués through a series of "hops" from one mote to the next. Without the need to build a mesh of base stations that must be wired or have a substantial supply of energy, creating information-bearing ad-hoc networks to suit each unique set of circumstances would significantly reduce costs.

"Wiring or 'beefing up' system resources is expensive and is often not feasible for many applications," Ayyorgun said, calling that a "major impetus" for wireless network research. But with nearly all motes dependent on a portable source of power like a battery, it is important that the devices be as energy efficient as possible. "Energy efficiency is a first-class design criterion," he said.

And energy utilization isn't the only consideration. Other performance aspects of concern include the system's connectivity; the delay, or time it takes for data to be transported; the throughput, which measures the amount of data the system can handle at once; and network security, to name a few. Many solutions aimed at advancing wireless sensor networks have managed to improve performance over at most a few metrics at the expense of others. Ayyorgun analogizes the conundrum to a Rubik's cube, the cube-shaped toy in which the aim is to match each of the six sides with one distinct color. Often, gains in one aspect of wireless sensor network performance such as energy efficiency have only been achieved with losses in another area, such as the end-to-end delay.

With Ayyorgun's scheme, however, "all of the colors have started to match," he said. The sensor network was more energy efficient with shorter delay times, and the other performance considerations mentioned earlier have all improved as well.  "The motes communicate randomly, but their random behavior-their genetic code, if you will-has collective intelligence by design," he said. That collective intelligence results in the concurrent performance gains over many aspects, he added.

"We have good colors on all sides, but it's not perfect yet," Ayyorgun said, emphasizing that wireless sensor networks are still in the development stage. Many issues remain to be addressed, just as we are beginning to realize the potential of these "networks of the future."

Ayyorgun acknowledges the support of the Laboratory Directed Research and Development Office at Los Alamos, the Los Alamos Engineering Institute, the Center for Nonlinear Studies, and colleagues, as well as his students.

Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, The Babcock & Wilcox Company, and Washington Group International for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.

Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns.

The latest buzz...

If you are looking for ways to expand the capabilities of your Mote deployment, there's a new sensor you should look into - introducing the new BumbleBee Radar! The BumbleBee is a coherent, pulsed Doppler radar offering rich information at a strikingly low price. Introduced in mid-April by The Samraksh Company, the radar ships ready for use with Crossbow's TelosB Motes.

 

Being a pulsed Doppler radar, the BumbleBee measures radial velocity directly. Because it is coherent, you can determine the sign of the velocity and measure the time structure of relative motion very precisely, even for small motions! Range is not measured directly, but in some contexts you can infer range from motion information.

The BumbleBee produces phase information directly resulting in motion information with a resolution of a fraction of a wavelength (i.e. fractions of a centimeter of displacement) which is an order of magnitude finer than if the radar were non-coherent. This information can be received at a rate of ~300 complex (i.e. real and imaginary pairs) samples per second. This capability opens up opportunities for original research and development in diverse signal processing applications.

BumbleBee's sensitivity is optimized for the normal day-to-day movements of people which makes it a compelling choice for monitoring and classifying human activities in commercial and recreational settings. This device could be used to monitor the usage of urban playgrounds, public parks, employer provided recreational facilities, office conference rooms and waiting areas. Quantitative measurements of loitering, underuse, overuse and unauthorized use would provide an improved basis for setting policy, deciding layouts or evaluating security measures.

Other interesting applications include the classification of unique patterns of movement, such as dancing or fighting in nightclubs, exercising or falling in a retirement home, and even working or sitting around on a construction site. Automated detection of various activities would expedite response in abnormal situations and provide positive feedback in normal situations. Not all applications need to center on people of course! For example BumbleBee can be used to do non-contact wobble detection of rotating machinery in industrial settings, monitor livestock activity, even recognize rodents or snakes in remote parts of a building or an urban infrastructure!

The BumbleBee facilitates information rich applications without compromising on Mote-scale constraints. It uses less than 40 mW or total power, has a range of ~10m, and is form factor compatible with Motes. Most importantly, its technology facilitates a new cost paradigm that is more compatible at a system level with the use of large scale Mote networks. At $100 USD/each, price is its most innovative feature! For more information contact info@samraksh.com.

BumbleBee is patented, but a usage license is made available as part of the purchase price for research usage. The Samraksh Company also promises very reasonable terms for small and mid-scale industrial applications. The radar conforms to FCC regulations for operation within the ISM unlicensed band (at 5.8GHz). Non-research applications may need additional FCC certification.

Who needs The Club when you've got SVATS!

According a report by the FBI, a vehicle is stolen every 26.4 seconds in the United States. The western states account for the highest rate of thefts in the USA, and 4 of the top 10 metropolitan areas were in California - made me feel very safe! Remember 'the club' from back in the day? I remember watching the commercials when I was a kid between episodes of Saved by the Bell and thinking that my parents should get one - it seemed like the perfect solution. Check out this commercial from the nineties (love the hairstyles and outfits).



Luckily today, things have progressed, and instead of having to whip out your club and strap it to the steering wheel of your car, you can install SVATS. SVATS is a sensor-network-based vehicle anti-theft system based on Crossbow's MICA2 Mote platform. Conceptualized by researchers at Penn State University, SVATS is designed to address the limitations of high cost, high false-alarm rate and the easy disabling function of current tracking/alarming systems. In this system, the vehicles in an area are outfitted with a sensor node and form a wireless sensor network. The nodes in the network then monitor and identify possible vehicle thefts by detecting unauthorized vehicle movement. When an unauthorized movement is detected, an alert is sent to the base station which sends warning messages to the security office or whomever is responsible for that area. The security system relies on networks of cars constantly gossiping with their neighbors using the concealed wireless nodes. The cars raise the alarm when a thief tries to make a getaway.

With vehicles playing an essential part in our every day life, there are many solutions to stop theft from lock systems (like the club), alarm systems (that we all ignore nowadays) and vehicle tracking/recovery systems. Most of these tracking/recovery systems require the user to purchase the product as well as pay a monthly maintenance fee, or use GPS which does not work indoors or is easily located and disabled. SVATS proposes to have a each vehicle equipped with a node, and each parking area forming its own sensor network with base station. Each node is powered by the vehicle's power source and controlled by a remote so that the user can turn it on so that the node sends a 'join' message and broadcasts its 'alive' message periodically. If it does not send out a 'leave' message that is authenticated by the user via remote that turns the node off, the neighboring sensors will detect the movement or should they not receive the 'leave' message report the problem to the base station and owner via alert. To track the vehicle SVATS used roadside access points already deployed to determine where the vehicle had been moved to. The researchers themselves drove off some cars to test how the system worked, and found that SVATS detected all such "thefts" in a matter of just 4 to 9 seconds. The system was apparently resistant to false alarms caused by weather, or people walking around the car park, both of which can affect the signals between sensors.

SVATS included four components network topology management, vehicle theft detection, intra-vehicle networking, and alert reporting. Using the MICA2 Mote platform in the sensor node for this deployment, researchers were able to use the self-forming, ad-hoc capability of the Motes to allow the device to find its neighbors and join the network. The vehicle theft detection was done with two techniques - count-based and statistical-based. RSSI signals and values were also used to determine whether a vehicle had been stolen or not. The system can also detect when a car is moving unexpectedly by measuring the signal strength of any "alive" messages. If a car detects significant changes in signal strength, it sends a warning message to other cars monitoring the same vehicle, because it is likely to be moving. However, it is only when a watching car receives more than three such warning signals from different sources that it will send out a theft alarm message to the base station. Ensuring that multiple cars must agree on a threat before the alarm is raised should cut out the false alarms that plague other anti-theft systems, say the researchers. Experimental evaluation of the SVATS system used a laptop as a base station and one sensor per vehicle in a Penn State parking lot.  The base station transmitted once per second while the vehicle sensors sent live messages every 200 milliseconds.

The key to SVATS is that the sensor nodes are cheap and easy to deploy. They are designed to work in a large network that creates a smart and safe environment. This solution can be deployed incrementally and the rapid response time it provides is motivation enough to install the SVATS sensor nodes. This research was funded by NSF and the Army research office. The researchers presented information on their system at the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineer's Infocom 2008 Conference in Phoenix.  

As one person said, stealing a car wont be easy for thieves anymore, thanks to this new type of car alarm that enables the vehicles to look after each other"s safety - just like a herd of animals under any potential threat from predators.

Imote2.Builder Kit featured in InfoWorld

InfoWorld has reviewed and featured Crossbow's Imote2.Builder kit in an article last week. The kit was reviewed by Strategic Developer Martin Heller who stated that, "The Imote2.Builder Kit makes creating wireless sensor networks a snap." From his article:

I spent several hours today exploring the Crossbow Imote2.Builder Kit, a "complete development environment for high performance wireless sensor networking (WSN) applications leveraging the Microsoft .NET Framework," as the company describes it.

(I'd never say "leveraging" and "Microsoft" in the same sentence myself if I could avoid it, because of Microsoft's rather checkered legal history of "leveraging" its near-monopoly -- but oops, I did it again. Back to Crossbow.)

The Imote2 .Builder Kit sells for $990 in the U.S. in small quantities. It includes three Imote2 processor boards, two Imote2 sensor boards, two battery boards, batteries, a USB cable, and software on CD-ROM. Obviously, individual boards are cheaper, especially in quantity.

Why so many boards? The processor boards also have radios, and can talk to each other using the 802.15.4 protocol. The Imote2 has an XScale CPU @ [13–416] MHz and a DSP, 256kB SRAM, 32 MB of SDRAM and 32 MB of FLASH, and baker's dozen of I/O ports of various stripes in addition to the radio and antenna. It has two pairs of connectors for sensor boards, a set for a "basic sensor board" on one side and an "advanced sensor board" on the other side. The flash image includes the .NET Micro Framework.

The sensor boards that come with the kit are of the basic variety, but I guess that refers to the connector they use: they actually have a 3d Accelerometer, an advanced temp/humidity sensor, a light sensor and 4 channel A/D.

The Imote2 software is an add-on to Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 (yes, 2005, not 2008) and .NET Micro Framework 2.0 (yes, 2.0, not 2.5). A 90-day trial version of Visual Studio 2005 Professional is provided with the kit.

I found the programming model for the Imote2 easy to understand, as I was already fluent in C# and familiar with Visual Studio 2005 and the .NET Micro Framework. I think I could build wireless sensor network applications with this kit very quickly: in days to weeks, depending on the complexity of the application.

The processors seem plenty fast. Debugging is trivially easy. The only trouble I had with the kit was a minor but annoying deployment issue: sometimes a board would stop taking downloads, and code deployment from Visual Studio would fail. I was always able to recover from this by stopping all the software on the PC that talked to the board, disconnecting the board from the USB bus, reconnecting and resetting the board, and restarting the software.

According to the company, this is most likely a problem with the Microsoft USBSPOT driver. Once I had a board programmed, it would be fine.

The picture at the top of this article is the hardware configuration for the most advanced demo in the kit, a star network in which two battery-powered CPU/sensor stacks transmit accelerometer data, one CPU board receives the signals and sends them over the USB cable, and the PC plots the live output, as shown at left. Overall, this is a very impressive kit.

Martin Heller is a Web and Windows programming consultant, is a Contributing Editor for InfoWorld. He develops databases, software and sites, and writes, edits and consults from his office in Andover, Massachusetts, as he has for over 20 years. For more information on Crossbow's Imote2.Builder kit, please contact sales or visit our website here.

Intelligent Transportation Systems

When I think about the future of transportation, the image that pops into my mind is the world of the Jetsons - a world of automation and intelligent transportation systems. A place where machines have the ability to sense and understand their surroundings to allow for a safer more efficient transportation environment. With major innovations slowly taking place all around us, we do not realize how quickly Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) are becoming part of our every day life. Implementations such as FastTrack to stop delays at bridge tolls, new technology in vehicles such as the Lexus LS 460 with advanced parking guidance so the car can park itself, Land Rover with adjustable suspension TerrainResponse™, or the Infiniti with wireless connectivity...all these innovations lend themselves to creating more intelligence in the transportation sector.

What is an intelligent transportation system? The term refers to efforts to add information and communications technology to transport infrastructure and vehicles in an effort to manage factors that typically are at odds with each other, such as vehicles, loads, and routes to improve safety and reduce vehicle wear, transportation times and fuel consumption. The last few years have seen the emergence of many new technologies that can potentially have major impacts on Intelligent Transportation Systems. A recent study by the UK Governments Office of Science and Innovation, which examined how future intelligent infrastructure would evolve to support transportation over the next 50 years looked at a range of new technologies, systems and services that may emerge over that period. One key class of technology that was identified as having a significant role in delivering future intelligence to the transport sector were wireless sensor networks (Motes) and in particular the fusion of fixed and mobile networks to help deliver a safe, sustainable and robust future transport system based on the better collection of data, its processing and dissemination and the intelligent use of the data in a fully connected environment. Motes can also be augmented with additional sensors – such as those for detecting light, temperature and acceleration – hence enhancing their features and making their application areas virtually limitless. It is generally perceived that Motes will become the low-cost, ubiquitous sensor of the future, especially once its size shrinks dramatically to merit its name.

Researchers at Newcastle University have been at the forefront of looking into the technology challenges of using these small, low-cost and smart wireless sensors in transport and the application areas where they could be employed. It is clear to the ITS community that the emergence of low cost sensors will open up new paradigms in how we can pervasively collect data from sensors, convey information along fixed and mobile low cost wireless networks (partly or fully formed or ad-hoc) and provide a ‘connected environment’ where individuals, vehicles and infrastructure can co-exist and cooperate, thus delivering more knowledge about the transport environment, the state of the network and who indeed is traveling or wishes to travel. This may offer benefits in terms of real-time management, optimization of transport systems, intelligent design and the use of such systems for innovative road charging and possibly carbon trading schemes as well as through the Cooperative Vehicle and Highway Systems for safety and control applications. See the research and potential use of a Mote based wireless sensor network in the video below:

Initial studies suggest vehicle to vehicle, vehicle to infrastructure, and infrastructure to infrastructure communication and in-vehicle monitoring and environmental monitoring may exist for Motes in the transport domain. Over the last few years, many different versions of 'smartdust devices' have been designed and built by various companies and institutions. Such devices can be used to sense a wide range of environmental parameters as well as vehicle speed, vehicle direction and vehicle presence in the infrastructure. Even though there are several platforms available on the market, Newcastle University chose Crossbow's MICA family motes for the EMMA and TRACKSS projects due to its commercial success in many wireless sensor network applications. Also, Newcastle University has successfully used MICA family motes in its other research projects such as the ASTRA project. Low power wireless communication and low power sensing capabilities are essential for sensor network applications which are supported by Crossbow's Mote family.

The ASTRA project investigated the use of mobile ad-hoc networks, and more specifically, Motes for transport applications. The project examined the current state-of-the-art using MICA motes. A trial using Motes technology was hosted in Newcastle with a pervasive intelligent corridor established by a network of fixed Motes on roads near Newcastle Central Station. Mobile Motes were also placed in several buses. Communication between a static node and a moving node on-board a vehicle was achieved, showing that communication can take place between road side and vehicles using a network of Motes. Evaluation of the system revealed that the main limitation of the technology at the present time is battery life. The experiments have demonstrated that Motes can be used for communication between a fixed infrastructure and a moving vehicle up to a speed of 50 mph. Further testing of the devices at higher speeds (60 and 70 mph) to asses the suitability of smartdust/Motes in applications alongside fast moving roads such as a motorway will be conducted.

The focus of the EU funded TRACKSS project is to research advanced communications concepts, open inter operable and scalable system architectures that allow easy upgrading, advanced sensor infrastructure, dependable software, robust positioning technologies and their integration into intelligent co-operative systems to support a range of core functions in the areas of road and vehicle safety and traffic management and control. The overall aim is to develop new systems for cooperative sensing and predict flows, infrastructure and environmental conditions surrounding traffic, with a view to improving road transport safety and efficiency. To support the demonstration phase of the project, Newcastle University will develop a new technology for ‘smart’ detection on vehicles and infrastructure and a common framework for data collection and access from the entire array of sensors being deployed and tested in the TRACKSS project.

In the case of EMMA, the focus is automobiles and their constituent parts, and the infrastructure they utilize (both physical in the sense of roads and the ICT embedded in them for monitoring and control purposes). If we think more widely at present, most of the world’s computing power is already embedded invisibly into the things around us. The personal computers, music players and other gadgets are just the tip of the iceberg. They probably represent no more than 1% of the computing power we have deployed around us. A typical car today will have at least 20 microprocessors and a host of other electronics contributing to the general functionality required by a modern car as well as the ‘value added services’ which may be the unique selling point of a particular vehicle – whether the application, be: better information on how the vehicle is running; safety applications; or infotainment in the vehicle. The Embedded Middleware in Mobility Applications project (EMMA) application domain of transport will be taken as a pilot example where EMMA will foster cost-efficient ambient intelligence systems with optimal performance, high confidence and faster deployment. The MICAz Mote will be the best suitable platform for the EMMA project since it features sensing and networking capabilities with low power consumption.

The EMMA and TRACKSS projects being pursued by Newcastle University are committed to play a major role in creating new possibilities in the future ITS by using Mote technology. For more information on Crossbow's Mote platforms, contact sales or visit our website.

Motes in Antarctica!

Can you imagine a place where the temperature can get to -82°C? A place without sunlight for half the year. Imagine a frozen desert with no permanent human population - the coldest, driest and windiest continent on earth... It is in this place that research scientists from the Institute of Remote Sensing Applications at the Chinese Academy of Sciences have deployed a wireless sensing system using Crossbow's Mote platforms. Being a resident of sunny California I can barely fathom such an environment. If the temperature drops below 50°F (10°C), I want a cup of hot chocolate and a fire to cuddle in front of. Imagine being in a place where the climate is so harsh - there are no plants or animals. Talk about extreme sensing!

China News reported that the wireless sensor network called the 'Unmanned Wireless Intelligent Snow and Ice Observation System in Extreme Environments' has been successfully set up around the Dome-A area near the South Pole, which is the southernmost point on Earth's surface. Dome-A (Dome Argus) is the highest and possibly coldest place in Antarctica and perhaps the coldest naturally occurring place on Earth. It is the highest ice feature in Antarctica, comprising a dome or eminence of 4.093 m elevation.  The system was co-developed by Crossbow Technology and the Chinese Academy of Science to develop a solution that can consistently work under extreme environmental conditions such as a 4-month polar-night, -82°C temperature lows and an annual average temperature of -55°C. The wireless system deployed by CAS scientists is designed to overcome the low-temperature, high-altitude and soft snow-surface.

The deployed system consists of two base stations and four nodes. Each node is powered by two low-temperature resistant batteries which are expected to last for one year. The communication capability between each node can achieve ranges of up to 1000m. Each node samples environmental data every 15 minutes, including temperature (weather temperature, snow temperature and the snow temperature below 1 meter), humidity, sunlight, and air pressure. The collected data is sent wirelessly to the central base station that collects and sends the data to Beijing every day. Meanwhile, the other remote base station is used to store the data locally to be collected later by an expedition team. The two base stations ensure that no data is lost in the communication.

The Antarctic ice sheet where Dr. Xiao and his scientific expedition team ventured is the highest point on the continent. The group hopes to gather vital information on the environment and observing conditions around Dome-A to determine whether or not it is a viable location to expand the observatories in the region. Dome A claims the best astronomical sky conditions in the world, as it is devoid of clouds and boasting steady air that makes for clear viewing. Imagine...Motes in Antarctica!