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NSF Embedded Networked Sensing Center Established
Researchers Will Develop New Tools to Monitor the Environment
By Marlys Amundson
For the first time, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has selected UCLA as one of its Science and Technology Centers - the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing (CENS).
Researchers in CENS will develop embedded networked sensing systems using tiny sensors and actuators that can be densely distributed within a natural or man-made environment to monitor and collect information.
"This technology will help us connect the physical world just as the Internet has allowed us to connect the world of computers," explains computer science professor Deborah Estrin, who will direct the Center. "Not only will we be able to collect information not available before, but eventually we will have the ability to design systems that independently take action once a pollutant, structural failure, or other hazard is detected."
Initially the Center will concentrate on developing the fundamental technology to create the sensor networks. To ensure that the networks will be able to operate without constant human supervision, researchers will focus on developing devices that can organize themselves into a network, repair themselves, and manage their own power consumption.
Chancellor Albert Carnesale notes, "We're proud of this recognition by the National Science Foundation. The selection of our Center for Embedded Networked Sensing as one of the NSF's new Science and Technology Centers is a tribute to the excellence of UCLA's research programs in engineering, the physical sciences, and education. UCLA has a tradition of developing and advancing state-of-the-art technologies across disciplines, and the Center will further establish the University as a leader in this promising new field. The Center also will serve the surrounding community, through its environmental research and inquiry-based science education programs at local middle schools."
Through his affiliation with the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center (PEER), civil and environmental engineering professor John Wallace, a CENS researcher, has discovered that an NSF Center allows researchers to systematically organize a research program to pursue a problem that they may not otherwise have the resources to solve.
Wallace explains, "An NSF center allows you to lay out a long-term research agenda without worrying about having the funding down the road. It also makes it easier to collaborate with other departments and research areas and to approach the problem from different directions. When you work together, you end up with something better."
The CENS researchers will develop methods to densely instrument structures, allowing them to gather better seismic data. Inexpensive networked sensors, like those envisioned by CENS, could be semi-permanently installed in a building and ready to measure an earthquake when it occurs. "There's nothing like real data from real structures. The data you could collect in one significant earthquake would dwarf 10 years of lab data and testing," adds Wallace.
Nearly 20 UCLA faculty, including computer scientists, electrical, civil, and environmental engineers, biologists and geophysicists are involved with the Center, as are faculty from USC, UC Riverside, the Jet Propulsion Lab, and Caltech. Electrical engineering professors Gregory Pottie and Mani Srivastava, both experts in the area of wireless sensor networks, will serve as the Center's deputy directors.
"CENS reflects the School's renewed focus on a truly interdisciplinary environment, as well as the convergence of the information sciences and other disciplines. The potential impact of their work on other areas of study is tremendous," notes Vijay K. Dhir, interim dean of the School. "CENS will leverage the experience and knowledge of researchers in a wide range of fields, and expand the types of applications for embedded networked sensing technologies."
Using CENS technologies, researchers will be developing applications in areas critical to Southern California, including earthquakes, pollution, and ecological impact studies.
One of CENS' objectives is to develop and deploy a dense network of miniature probes able to measure contaminant levels at their location, automatically extract targeted information, and send it to a central database.
"What makes the project unique is that we're learning how to successfully deploy large, dense arrays of sensors that will stream huge amounts of information back to users without drowning them with data," explains civil and environmental engineering professor Tom Harmon. "The key to developing a successful system is the computer science and electrical engineering research on processing the network of signals flowing from complex, real systems."
Current contaminant transport monitoring studies are a tremendous drain on a researcher's and the graduate students' time and energy. Tracking the propagation of contaminants in soil involves inserting dozens of extraction devices into a sampling area, removing and analyzing the samples, and then repeating the process. This method not only limits how close together the contaminant samples can be taken, but also biases the results of the study by disrupting the flow regime. CENS' approach would eliminate the need to take manual samples, ensuring that the results are not biased, while facilitating concentrated sampling at a fraction of the effort.
Once a series of lab studies have demonstrated the viability of embedded networked sensing in a contaminant transport system, the CENS researchers will begin deploying the systems in a range of possible environmental applications, including detecting underground gas tank leaks. "A dense network of sensors would provide early, accurate information on unknown risks so as to avoid massive problems such as the contamination of Santa Monica's groundwater supply by gasoline additives," Harmon adds.
Director of Strategic Research Initiatives for the South Campus Sciences Janette Miller says, "We have outstanding faculty at UCLA, as well as a rich history of collaborative research, and our new centers provide the infrastructure for research free from the constraints of funding and facilities. Both CENS and UCLA's new NASA Institute for Cellular Mimetic Space Exploration (CMISE) make it possible for our faculty, researchers, and graduate students working across disciplines to benefit from new resources to explore and advance new approaches to 21st century science and engineering problems."
Please see http://www.cens.ucla.edu/ for additional information about the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing.
MK-II photo: Todd Cheney, UCLA Photography
Contaminant studies image appears courtesy of Tom Harmon
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