An innovative new communication system that enables battery-free devices to connect to Wi-Fi networks will be crucial in developing the Internet of Things (IoT), it has been claimed.
The ‘Wi-Fi Backscatter’ technology, which has been developed by a team of researchers from the University of Washington, harnesses energy produced by radio and television signals, allowing low-powered devices to connect to existing wireless infrastructure.
This is something that Shyam Gollakota, the university’s assistant professor of computer science and engineering, thinks is vital to the IoT’s ongoing development.
He was quoted by zdnet.com as saying: “If Internet of Things devices are going to take off, we must provide connectivity to the potentially billions of battery-free devices that will be embedded in everyday objects.”
Researchers at Gartner suggest there will be approximately 26 billion devices connected to the IoT by the end of the decade, not including smartphones, tablets and conventional computers. It is thought that the technology will be particularly useful for sensors and wearable tech, such as smartwatches.
The Washington team is set to publish the results of its work later this month at a conference held by the Association for Computing Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Data Communication. The researchers also plan to start a dedicated company to further the technology, fiercewireless.com reports.
