Exploiting parallelism and dynamic reconfiguration in sensor networks

Abstract

This project proposes the use of FlexPar to exploit parallelism and dynamic reconfiguration in sensor networking environments. FlexPar was devised over my post-doctoral (PD) research at UNICAMP and is a middleware that creates parallel applications at runtime. The project plans to continue the work that I have started over my PD studies that was financially supported by FAPESP. This financial support was ended because I was appointed as a Lecturer at the University of São Paulo, since May/2008. The work in this project is aimed at exploiting the use of FlexPar in environments where resources are particularly scarce. Such environment includes sensor nodes and embedded devices where memory availability and CPU power are limited. The key question is to find out whether parallelism can be taken into account in these kinds of environments. The project also comprehends the work to exploit dynamic reconfiguration in the same kind of environment. The goal of this particular research is to provide a platform in which applications is adaptable to the current context at runtime. This will enable us to save memory or load a new policy according to the needs of the target environment and application domain. The work in this project will be carried out at the School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities (EACH/USP), where I am currently affiliated to. This project will initially be formed by undergraduates students, however graduate students will potentially join this work once post-doctoral studies is established at EACH/USP. (AU)