Internet of Things (IoT): Operating System, Applications and Protocols Design, and Validation Techniques

By combining energy efficient micro-controllers, low-power radio transceivers, and sensors as well as actuators in so called smart objects, we are able to connect the digital cyber world with the physical world as in cyber physical systems. In the vision of the Internet of Things, these smart objects should be seamlessly integrated into the traditional Internet. Typically, smart objects are heavily constrained in terms of computation, memory and energy resources. Furthermore, the commonly used wireless links among smart objects or towards the Internet are typically slow and subject to high packet loss. Such characteristics pose challenges, on one hand in terms of software running on smart objects, and on the other hand in terms of network protocols which smart objects use to communicate. New operating systems, application programming interfaces, frameworks, and middleware have to be designed with consideration of such constraints. In consequence, novel validation methods and experimental tools are needed to study smart object networks in vivo, new software platforms are needed to efficiently operate smart objects, and innovative networking paradigms and protocols are required to interconnect smart objects.