Harvard Sensor Networks Lab

Welcome

The Harvard Sensor Networks Lab investigates software solutions for efficient, high-data-rate, adaptive wireless sensor networking systems. We also work closely with domain scientists in medicine, geophysics, and public health to direct our research towards real-world applications of this technology. On this site you can explore our various projects, publications, talks, and group members.

The HSNL is part of the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

Research Projects

Pixie - An operating system supporting resource-aware programming for sensor networks
Lance - Utility-driven signal collection in high-data-rate sensor networks
Macroprogramming - High-level programming for wireless sensors
- Regiment, a spatial macroprogramming language
- Flask, a dataflow-oriented intermediate language
Sensor networks for medical applications:
- Mercury - A wearable sensor platform for high-resolution motion analysis
- CodeBlue - Sensor networks for physiological monitoring and disaster response
Testbeds and tools for sensor network experimentation:
- CitySense - An urban-scale WiFi sensor testbed
- LiveNet - Using passive monitoring to reconstruct sensor network dynamics
- MoteLab - Indoor, Web-enabled sensor network testbed
Monitoring volcanic activity with wireless sensor networks
- Deployment at Tungurahua volcano, Ecuador, August 2007
- Deployment at Reventador volcano, Ecuador, August 2005
- Deployment at Tungurahua volcano, Ecuador, July 2004

Previous projects:

Hourglass and SBONs - Wide-area data collection and querying networks
MoteTrack - RF signature-based indoor localization

SIGCOMM 2009 paper accepted

Mon, 06/08/2009 - 22:39 — Matt Welsh

HSNL grad student Rohan Murty has a paper coming up in SIGCOMM 2009 on White Space Networking with Wi-Fi like Connectivity. This is joint work with members of Microsoft Research's networking research group, including Ranveer Chandra, Thomas Moscibroda, and Victor (Paramvir) Bahl. The paper describes the first Wi-Fi like wireless network running on top of the UHF "white spaces", portions of the TV band not occupied by TV channels (and other incumbents, such as wireless microphones).

Matt Welsh's blog
Login to post comments

Jim Gray Seed Grant

Thu, 06/04/2009 - 09:25 — Matt Welsh

The HSNL has been awarded a Jim Gray Seed Grant from Microsoft Research for a project called "Rethinking Wireless Networks From the Air Up". This project will explore a new architecture for wireless networks beyond existing standards and protocols, for example, in the UHF white spaces. We will build a software-defined radio testbed at Harvard that will provide full programmability and extensive instrumentation. By permitting reconfiguration at every layer of the protocol stack, we will develop a highly dynamic network architecture that allows for customized policies for managing variable traffic demands.

This project will be headed by HSNL graduate student Rohan Murty and Prof. Matt Welsh. We will collaborate closely with the networking research group at Microsoft Research.

Matt Welsh's blog
Login to post comments

Postdoctoral Fellowship opening

Wed, 05/27/2009 - 19:22 — Matt Welsh

We have openings for postdoctoral researchers to be supported through the National Science Foundation's Computing Innovation Fellows program. If you are a U.S.-based PhD student who is about to complete your degree and are interested in doing a postdoc in our group, please contact Prof. Matt Welsh. Be sure to attach your CV and mention that this is in regards to the CI Fellows program!

Matt Welsh's blog
Login to post comments

HotOS paper posted

Wed, 05/13/2009 - 13:31 — Matt Welsh

The camera-ready version of our position paper for HotOS 2009, Peloton: Coordinated Resource Management for Sensor Networks, has been posted here!

Matt Welsh's blog
Login to post comments

Call for Papers: ACM SenSys 2009

Tue, 01/27/2009 - 12:44 — Matt Welsh

The call for papers for the 7th ACM Conference on Embedded Networked Sensor Systems (SenSys'09) has been posted. I am the program co-chair along with Jie Liu from Microsoft Research, and David Culler from Berkeley is the general chair. Abstracts are due on April 1 and full papers on April 8.

I encourage you to submit your best work on wireless sensor networks, in all their forms. This year we are broadening the scope of the conference to include non-"traditional" sensor network systems. Feel free to contact me if you have questions about the submission process or what kinds of papers we're looking for.

Matt Welsh's blog

HSNL featured in Christian Science Monitor

Fri, 01/23/2009 - 16:13 — Matt Welsh

The Christian Science Monitor published an article today entitled "New Networks take Nature's Pulse" that features work done by our lab, including the volcano monitoring and CitySense projects.

Matt Welsh's blog
Login to post comments

Welcome to Alex Wissner-Gross

Thu, 10/09/2008 - 13:38 — Matt Welsh

Alex Wissner-Gross has joined the HSNL as a postdoctoral reseacher, supported by a two-year fellowship from the Harvard University Center for the Environment. Alex is a condensed matter physicist with interests concerning the science and technology of programmable media, with a recent focus on the intersection of computation, energy, and the environment. Alex received his Ph.D. in Physics in 2007 from Harvard University for his work on programmable surfaces. His research will involve developing a framework for instrumenting computers and other network-capable devices with enough intelligence to monitor and manage their own environmental footprints.