Theoretical Limits on Multiuser Molecular Communication in Internet of Nano-Bio Things.

In nano-bio networks, multiple transmitter-receiver pairs will operate in the same medium. Both inter-symbol interference and multi-user interference can cause saturation at the receiver side, and this effect may cause an outage. Thus, we propose a tractable framework to calculate the theoretical operating points for fully absorbing receiver

D-DSC: Decoding Delay-based Distributed Source Coding for Internet of Sensing Things.

Spatial correlation between densely deployed sensor nodes in a wireless sensor network (WSN) can be exploited to reduce the power consumption through a proper source coding mechanism such as distributed source coding (DSC). In this paper, we propose the Decoding Delay-based Distributed Source Coding (D-DSC) to improve the energy efficiency of the classical DSC by employing the decoding delay concept which enables the use of the maximum correlated portion of sensor samples during the event estimation. In D-DSC, network is partitioned into clusters, where the clusterheads communicate their uncompressed samples carrying the side information, and the cluster members send their compressed samples. Sink performs joint decoding of the compressed and uncompressed samples and then reconstructs the event signal using the decoded sensor readings. Based on the observed degree of the correlation among sensor samples, the sink dynamically updates and broadcasts the varying compression rates back to the sensor nodes. Simulation results for the performance evaluation reveal that D-DSC can achieve reliable and energy-efficient event communication and estimation for practical signal detection/estimation applications having massive number of sensors towards the realization of Internet of Sensing Things (IoST)

Fabrication and microfluidic analysis of graphene-based molecular communication receiver for Internet of Nano Things (IoNT).

Bio-inspired molecular communications (MC), where molecules are used to transfer information, is the most promising technique to realise the Internet of Nano Things (IoNT), thanks to its inherent biocompatibility, energy-efficiency, and reliability in physiologically-relevant environments. Despite a substantial body of theoretical work concerning MC, the lack of practical micro/nanoscale MC devices and MC testbeds has led researchers to make overly simplifying assumptions about the implications of the channel conditions and the physical architectures of the practical transceivers in developing theoretical models and devising communication methods for MC. On the other hand, MC imposes unique challenges resulting from the highly complex, nonlinear, time-varying channel properties that cannot be always tackled by conventional information and communication tools and technologies (ICT). As a result, the reliability of the existing MC methods, which are mostly adopted from electromagnetic communications and not validated with practical testbeds, is highly questionable. As the first step to remove this discrepancy, in this study, we report on the fabrication of a nanoscale MC receiver based on graphene field-effect transistor biosensors. We perform its ICT characterisation in a custom-designed microfluidic MC system with the information encoded into the concentration of single-stranded DNA molecules. This experimental platform is the first practical implementation of a micro/nanoscale MC system with nanoscale MC receivers, and can serve as a testbed for developing realistic MC methods and IoNT applications.Tis work was supported in part by the ERC (Project MINERVA, ERC-2013-CoG #616922) and by the AXA Research Fund (AXA Chair for Internet of Everything at Koc University)

Serum Neopterin and Procalcitonin Levels in Relationship with Pediatric Burn Wound Infections

Infection and septic complications in burn patients can be monitored by procalcitonin (PCT) and neopterin plasma values. The aim of the study was to investigate serum neopterin and PCT levels with WBC (white blood cell) and CRP (C-reactive protein) levels in patient group (PG) and healthy control group (HCG) and to investigate the relationship of these markers with burn wound infections (BWI). As the PG, 23 patients between 0–12 ages and up to 30% Total Body Surface Area (TBSA) burned and 15 HCG were included. PCT, neopterin, WBC, and CRP results on the first, the seventh, the fourteenth and the 21st day have been compared. During the follow-up period, 11 patients with BWI and 12 patients without BWI were classified as infected and non-infected patients, respectively. PCT and neopterin levels were detected higher in patients with BWI but no significant difference were present. Also, PCT and neopterin levels within the first 24 hours following the burn were detected higher in PG than HCG. CRP and WBC levels were detected high due to burn trauma. PCT and neopterin levels were increased in patients with BWI. PCT levels were increased during the pre-infectious period, while neopterin levels increased during the post-infectious period

D-DSC: Decoding Delay-based Distributed Source Coding for Internet of Sensing Things.

Spatial correlation between densely deployed sensor nodes in a wireless sensor network (WSN) can be exploited to reduce the power consumption through a proper source coding mechanism such as distributed source coding (DSC). In this paper, we propose the Decoding Delay-based Distributed Source Coding (D-DSC) to improve the energy efficiency of the classical DSC by employing the decoding delay concept which enables the use of the maximum correlated portion of sensor samples during the event estimation. In D-DSC, network is partitioned into clusters, where the clusterheads communicate their uncompressed samples carrying the side information, and the cluster members send their compressed samples. Sink performs joint decoding of the compressed and uncompressed samples and then reconstructs the event signal using the decoded sensor readings. Based on the observed degree of the correlation among sensor samples, the sink dynamically updates and broadcasts the varying compression rates back to the sensor nodes. Simulation results for the performance evaluation reveal that D-DSC can achieve reliable and energy-efficient event communication and estimation for practical signal detection/estimation applications having massive number of sensors towards the realization of Internet of Sensing Things (IoST)

Transmitter and Receiver Architectures for Molecular Communications: A Survey on Physical Design with Modulation, Coding, and Detection Techniques

Inspired by nature, molecular communications (MC), i.e., the use of molecules to encode, transmit, and receive information, stands as the most promising communication paradigm to realize the nanonetworks. Even though there has been extensive theoretical research toward nanoscale MC, there are no examples of implemented nanoscale MC networks. The main reason for this lies in the peculiarities of nanoscale physics, challenges in nanoscale fabrication, and highly stochastic nature of the biochemical domain of envisioned nanonetwork applications. This mandates developing novel device architectures and communication methods compatible with MC constraints. To that end, various transmitter and receiver designs for MC have been proposed in the literature together with numerable modulation, coding, and detection techniques. However, these works fall into domains of a very wide spectrum of disciplines, including, but not limited to, information and communication theory, quantum physics, materials science, nanofabrication, physiology, and synthetic biology. Therefore, we believe it is imperative for the progress of the field that an organized exposition of cumulative knowledge on the subject matter can be compiled. Thus, to fill this gap, in this comprehensive survey, we review the existing literature on transmitter and receiver architectures toward realizing MC among nanomaterial-based nanomachines and/or biological entities and provide a complete overview of modulation, coding, and detection techniques employed for MC. Moreover, we identify the most significant shortcomings and challenges in all these research areas and propose potential solutions to overcome some of them.This work was supported in part by the European Research Council (ERC) Projects MINERVA under Grant ERC-2013-CoG #616922 and MINERGRACE under Grant ERC-2017-PoC #780645

Energy-neutral wireless-powered networks

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a key enabler for remote monitoring and control of any medium with wireless devices deployed in substantial numbers. However, these devices often lack the desired lifetimes due to their incompetent batteries. If the envisaged scale of the IoT is realized, replenishing millions of batteries will become impractical. To address this issue, joint utilization of two prominent technologies, energy harvesting (EH) and wireless power transfer (WPT), is explored in this paper. By coupling data from empirical measurements on EH profiles with Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations on indoor WPT, we propose and numerically evaluate design guidelines for energy-neutral wireless-powered networks, in which a source first extracts energy from its medium and then uses the collected energy to operate wireless devices via WPT. The initial findings reveal that the IoT devices in a 100m2 office building can be remotely energized by only three EH-enabled wireless power transmitting sources validating the proposed architecture