"Zero-Energy Smart Sensor Nodes"

- Jan M. Rabaey, Donald O. Pederson Distinguished Professor, University of California at Berkeley

When the concept of “smart dust” was launched in the mid 90’s, the dream was quite some distance away from reality. Integrated wireless sensor nodes were multiple cm3 in size, and needed to contain substantial battery if long-term operation was desired Over the span of two decades, we have seen smart dust coming close to reality to a combination of technology scaling, innovative circuit and system design, sensor integration and energy harvesting. In this tutorial, we will discuss this evolution using some existing examples from bio- and environmental sensing.
Yet, we are not done yet. Further evolutions in sensing, processing, communication and energy harvesting and management open the door for even further miniaturization and will lead to the truly “instrumented society”. We will discuss some potential directions along those lines.