Internet of things

In an article for Forbes, Sloan Research Scientist Ranjan Pal and Prof. Bodhibrata Nag of the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta highlight the  risks associated with the rise of Internet of things-driven smart cities and homes. “Unlike traditional catastrophic bond markets, where the (natural) catastrophe does not affect financial stability, a cyber-catastrophe can affect financial stability,” they write. “Hence, more information is needed by bond writing parties to screen cyber-risk exposure to guarantee no threat to financial stability.”

Popular Science reporter Andrew Paul writes that MIT engineers have developed a new chip for smart phones that blocks unwanted signals, which could “greatly reduce production costs, make devices smaller and more efficient, and potentially even improve battery life.” Graduate student Soroush Araei explains that “our research can make your devices work better with fewer dropped calls or poor connections caused by interference from other devices.”

Research scientist Ryan Hamerly and his team are working to harness “the low power consumption of hybrid optical devices for smart speakers, lightweight drones and even self-driving cars,” reports The Economist. 

Alexander Sludds, a graduate student in MIT’s Research Lab for Electronics, joins Megan Cantwell on the Science magazine podcast to discuss his team’s new method for processing data on edge devices, which are devices that connect two networks together.

Prof. Yoel Fink speaks with Washington Post reporter Pranshu Verma about the growing field of smart textiles and his work creating fabrics embedded with computational power. Fink and his colleagues “have created fibers with hundreds of silicon microchips to transmit digital signals — essential if clothes are to automatically track things like heart rate or foot swelling. These fibers are small enough to pass through a needle that can be sown into fabric and washed at least 10 times.”

Popular Science reporter Charlotte Hu writes that MIT researchers have developed an “electronics chip design that allows for sensors and processors to be easily swapped out or added on, like bricks of LEGO.” Hu writes that “a reconfigurable, modular chip like this could be useful for upgrading smartphones, computers, or other devices without producing as much waste.”

MIT engineers have developed a wireless, reconfigurable chip that could easily be snapped onto existing devices like a LEGO brick, reports Miriam Fauzia for The Daily Beast. “Having the flexibility to customize and upgrade an old device is a modder’s dream,” writes Fauzia, “but the chip may also help reduce electronic waste, which is estimated at 50 million tons a year worldwide.”

Indian Express reporter Sethu Pradeep writes that MIT researchers have developed a low-energy security chip designed to prevent side channel attacks on smart devices. “It can be used in any sensor nodes which connects user data,” explains graduate student Saurav Maji. “For example, it can be used in monitoring sensors in the oil and gas industry, it can be used in self-driving cars, in fingerprint matching devices and many other applications.”

Nextiles, an MIT startup founded by alumnus George Sun, is developing smart threads, reports John Koetsier for Forbes. “We’re literally trying to sew the same kind of highway of data streams that you can normally find in a computer chip, but do that in clothing,” says Sun.

MIT researchers have developed new programmable fibers that could help transform clothing into wearable computers, reports Kyle Mizokami for Popular Mechanics. “The polymer fibers contain hundreds of tiny silicon microchips that, once electrified, can sustain a digital connection across tens of meters,” Mizokami writes.

Forbes contributor Eric Tegler spotlights how MIT researchers are developing a fiber with digital capabilities. “Individuals wearing garments with digital fibers could be alerted to vital information about their physiology and environmental exposures, and share health/injury and location data with support forces,” Tegler explains.

UPI reporter Brooks Hays writes that researchers from MIT and other institutions have developed a programmable digital fiber that can capture, store and analyze data. The technology could “be paired with machine learning algorithms and used to make smart fabrics to record health data and aid medical diagnosis,” writes Hays.

Writing for Wired, Will Knight spotlights how MIT researchers developed a new technique to squeeze an AI vision algorithm onto a low-power computer chip that can run for months on a battery. The advance “could help bring more advanced AI capabilities, like image and voice recognition, to home appliances and wearable devices, along with medical gadgets and industrial sensors.”

NPR’s Scott Simon remembers former MIT Professor Michael Hawley. Simon notes that Hawley’s “Things That Think and Toys of Tomorrow projects prophesied so much of the ways in which our world would become digitally connected.”

Technology Review reporter Will Knight spotlights how MIT researchers have developed a new chip that is many times more efficient than silicon chips and could help bring AI to a multitude of devices where power is limited. “We need new hardware because Moore’s law has slowed down,” explains Prof. Vivienne Sze.