The Convenience of Wireless Technology

SMARTDUST TECHNOLOGY BEGINS

What is Smartdust?

1. They are tiny Sensors. 
2. A tiny dust size device with extra-ordinary capabilities. 
3. A Wireless sensor Networks(WSN). 
4. Nodes in smartdust are called motes. 
5. Combines sensing, computing, wireless communication capabilities and autonomous power supply within volume of few millimeters.

How smartdust Works?

Smartdust is based on micro electromechanical systems, or MEMs. These tiny computer chips can measure temperatures, vibrations or surface pressures. Smart sensors relay signals back to a command computer, which then compiles the data to give feedback to plant managers or the results could trigger an automatic response, such as turning down a building's temperature or reducing the flow of oil. Such wireless tracking sensors are cheap. They cost just tens of dollars each, not the tens of thousands for comparable wired systems that often involve digging trenches and building outdoor conduits.

Communicating With a Smartdust

Smartdust full potential can only be attained when the sensor nodes communicate with one another or with a central base station. Wireless communication facilitates simultaneous data collection from thousands of sensors. There are several options for communicating to and from a cubic-mm computer. Radio-frequency communication is well under-stood, but currently requires minimum power levels in the multiple mw range due to analog mixers, filters, and oscillators. If whisker-thin antennas of length (in cm) can be accepted as a part of a dust mote, then reasonably efficient antennas can be made for radio-frequency communication, while the smallest complete radios are still on the order of a few hundred cubic millimeters, there is active work in the industry to produce cubic-millimeter radios.

Future Scope of Smartdust Technology

Imagine a cloud of sensors, each the size of a grain of sand, blown aloft by hurricane winds and relaying data on the storm to weather stations below or picture tiny robotic chips drifting through a human artery to locate, and eradicate, a hidden clot. While the above advances are likely far off, dozens of companies are working on the basic element for such inventions: Smartdust. Smartdust refers to tiny, wireless networks of sensors. You also could think of the sensors as tiny chips, or even miniature robots. The Smartdust detects data about light, temperatures or vibrations and transmits that data to larger computer systems. Researchers hope to shrink these devices to the size of a speck of dust via nanotechnology - the science of building molecule-size electronic devices. Some scientists see Smartdust as quite possibly a game-changing technology.

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