IoT systems are starting to become more useful than ever in monitoring environments over time and contributing to data that could be used to monitor climate change and weather patterns. One crucial part of a self-sustaining IoT system is the use of low power components and energy harvesting. My project within the Signal Kinetics lab is designing a passive to ultra-low power system to measure temperature in an underwater IoT system. This data would then be sent back to a receiver on land through backscatter using a piezoelectric antenna. The final goal of the project is to have a working subsystem that would be implemented on various iterations of the IoT project in the future.

I’ m participating in a SuperUROP with the Signal Kinetics lab because I want to dive deep into ultra-low power systems and investigate what different sensing modalities are possible in this state. Also, I feel that this specific lab has a lot of impact in studying the world’s oceans and monitoring possible factors contributing to climate change.