Feb.
26, 2004:
Our speaker is Dr.
Kris Pister (Dust Inc.),
and the
topic of his presentation is
"Smart Dust: Circuits and Applications".
Wireless sensor networks and mesh networking have recently come to the
attention of the media and the venture community. Companies such as
Crossbow, Dust Inc, Ember, and Millennial are all working to
commercialize this "next big thing". Applications of the technology
include building automation, industrial automation, medical monitoring,
asset tracking, security, and homeland defense. The Science Fiction
community was introduced to some of these Ideas through stories written
by Vernor Vinge, who is also a communications professor at UCSD.
The Key concept here is a peer-to-peer network created by a number of
very low power transceivers that form a communication mesh. In the
science fiction version, they are as small as dust, and are distributed
as an aerosol. In present incarnations, they are quite a bit larger, as
we will hear from our Speaker.
Dr. Kris Pister has spent the last decade of his life pushing the
academic limits of research in this field, as a Professor at UCLA and
then UC Berkeley. Much of the enthusiasm for the field of wireless
sensor networks can trace its roots to his DARPA-funded Smart Dust
project, which set several world records in ultra-low power circuits and
extreme miniaturization. For an example of his recent work see 'An
ultra low-energy ADC for Smart Dust'; IEEE Journal of Solid-State
Circuits, July 2003 Pages: 1123 - 1129.
Kris is an experienced leader who brings a record of successfully
partnering with industry and government to deliver groundbreaking
research into commercial applications. As the inventor of Smart Dust, he
provides the leadership and vision to bring this technology to market.
His prior successes include commercializing CAD for MEMS with Tanner
Research, polysilicon MEMS Micromirrors with OMM Inc, and xenon
difluoride etchers for semiconductor processing with STS and Xactix,
which was subsequently licensed by Sony. Kris is co-director of the
Berkeley Sensor & Actuator Center (BSAC), actively participates in the
Department of Defense research planning, and is a member of the JASONs.
He serves on the Advisory Boards for CrossBow and Nanomix. Kris holds a
PhD and MS in Electrical Engineering from UC Berkeley and a BS from UC
San Diego. He is currently on extended leave from his position as
professor of Electrical Engineering at UC Berkeley. In January of 2003
Pister became CEO of Dust Inc, with the goal of bringing low-cost,
long-life mesh networking to the masses.
SSC Technical meetings of SCV are held on The
THIRD Thursday of each month at:
Cadence Building 5 which is located at 2655 Seely Ave, San Jose,
95134.
Refreshments are provided at 6:30 PM and the talk typically starts at 7:00 PM.