Design and Realization of a Prototype Hardware Platform for ...

The MegaWatch Wireless PlatformMaster's Thesis - Emanuel Corthay11 Around the projectIn order to reach this goal, the following proposed improvements, grouped by subject areproposed:Radio subsystem :• Source coding techniques, at least Manchester encoding, and in the future, use of errorcorrection codes (like convolutional)• Signal power management providing RSSI readings and per frame power adaptation(software controlled)• Get closer to the IEEE 802.15.4 emergent standard for low-power short range applications• Improve the programming API to access the radio system, in particular, try to implement itas a Linux driver• Localization features and transmission range experiments• Support for other radio front-end chips like Chipcon, Bluetooth, 802.15.4, …• Implement the interrupt system so that the processor is alerted when a frame arrives. Atthe moment, the processor must poll the radio core to check if there is data to read• FPGA resource utilization improvements; The radio core can be further optimized to reduceits size in the FPGA. In particular, the FIFO should use the RAM available on the FPGArather than simple registers.Protocol subsystem:• Hardware RTS/CTS mechanism to avoid the hidden terminal problem• Fragmentation and reassembly mechanism, possibly in hardware (FPGA)• Software AODV Ad Hoc routing algorithm implementationPower measurements:• On board power measurements and management• Power saving radio systemHuman-Machine-Interface:• Improved keyboard, LEDs and buttons controller• On screen GUI (menus interacting with the buttons)• Powerful demonstration applicationThese proposals were offered formally as diploma or semester projects. Also, it is expected thatmore labs will start using the boards, and that stronger synergies will start to appear. For instance,the research results on the Ad-Hoc protocol at EPFL/LCA, or the future 802.15.4 transceiverdeveloped at EPFL/LEG can be later incorporated in the project.11.3.2 Semester and Master projectsThe following semester and Master’s Thesis work proposals have been put on the web site. Theyare directly inferred from the improvement section. One Master’s student and 2 semester studentswill be working from March to July 2004 on project 2, 3 and 7, and others will follow in October2004. That’s a total of 3 sub-projects to supervise. That’s the maximum capacity of CédricGaudin, who will follow these work.The common introduction is:The MegaWatch platform is a small 20 units versatile hardware platform designed to test variouswireless networking techniques. One of the key research interests is ad-hoc networking, or theability to build a self organized, infrastructure-less wireless network. New generation networks willmost likely include such mobile network topology.Project 1: Open to 1 or 2 studentsImprove the radio subsystem of the MegaWatch wireless platform73 / 83