Ali Abedi and Mohammad Mazaheri won first place at the ACM Student Research Competition at MobiCom 2018, the 24thACM Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking.
Their paper, “Bringing mmWave communications to Raspberry Pi,” examined the feasibility of using mmWave technology, a spectral band employed in high-speed wireless communications, to design networks for Internet-of-Things devices.
Professor Omid Abari (L), Mohammad Mazaheri (centre) and Ali Abedi (R) display the mmPi — a high-speed wireless communications device they created that employs a low-cost and low-power mmWave radio operating as a daughterboard on a Raspberry Pi computer.
In 2017, an estimated 8.4 billion devices were connected to the Internet, a figure expected to more than double to 20 billion by 2020. This rapid expansion in IoT devices is increasingly straining Wi-Fi and cellular networks. Millimetre wave (mmWave) radio frequency bands can help address this problem by providing additional bandwidth.
“The mmPi device we created can operate at different mmWave sub-bands while maintaining high signal strength,” Ali Abedi said. “The mmPi’s compatibility with Raspberry Pi opens the door to mmWave solutions for many IoT and dense wireless network devices.”
“Our measurements show that signal strength is strong enough that the mmPi can maintain high data rates with a receiver,” Mohammad Mazaheri added. “We think the mmPi will help advance mmWave research for many IoT applications.”
Ali Abedi presented the team’s research at the 24thAnnual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking, which was held in New Delhi, India from October 29 to November 2, 2018.
The ACM Student Research Competition, sponsored by Microsoft, offers a unique forum for undergraduate and graduate students to present original research before a panel of judges and attendees at ACM-sponsored and co-sponsored conferences.
To learn more about this research, please see Mohammad H. Mazaheri, Ali Abedi and Omid Abari. 2018. Bringing mmWave Communications to Raspberry Pi. Proceedings of the 24thAnnual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking, October 29 to November 2, 2018, pp. 687–89.