Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

ECpE Professor Seeks to Improve Cell Phone Technologies, Wins Best Poster Award

 

Contacts:
Sang Kim, ECpE associate professor, (515) 294-2726
Dana Schmidt, ECpE communications specialist, (515) 294-3071, schmidtdiastate.edu

Ames, Iowa – Want a smaller, lighter-weight cell phone with a longer battery life? Sang Kim, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, is working on a technology to make that a reality.

Kim is currently developing a cooperative-relaying technique to improve the reliability of communications and reduce the amount of energy it takes to transmit information in mobile, ad hoc, and sensor wireless networks. As a result, this new technique will increase the speed at which these wireless networks—including cellular telephone networks—can exchange information.

“When I talk on my cell phone, for example, my voice message is sent through someone else’s cell phone,” Kim says. “The basic idea is that each cell phone alone may have limited capability, but collaboratively a number of cell phones (aka radios) may achieve a significant performance improvement.”

Kim’s recent research poster entitled "Concatenated Random Parity Forwarding in Wireless Sensor Networks" was chosen from a record number of submissions to win a prestigious Best Poster Award at the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers’ Communications Society Conference on Sensors, Mesh, and Ad Hoc Communications and Networks. In the poster, Kim examines how this technology can be used to decrease energy consumption and extend the wireless networks’ lifetime.

“When the new technique is applied in cellular phones, the battery life can be extended, phone size and weight can be reduced, and more users can talk at the same time without requiring additional frequency,” says Kim.

Kim’s current research, still in its early stages, aims to determine how to stimulate cooperation between radios and ensure security. In the future, Kim plans to collaborate with experts in areas such as security, networks, economics, and biology to further the technology he’s developing. This technology could impact areas such as homeland security, emergency response communications, wireless entertainment, and remote health care monitoring, in addition to next-generation cell phones.

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