CIS 3990 (Spring 2024): Mobile and IoT Computing

Lecture: Monday & Wednesday 1:45 - 3:15 PM @ Towne 319
Instructor: Mingmin Zhao
TA: Haowen Lai
Office Hour: Monday 3:30 - 4:30 PM @ Moore 103

Course Overview

The convergence of mobile computing, Internet of Things (IoT), and artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing how we interact with the world increasingly driven by data. This course is designed to provide a deep understanding of the foundational principles of mobile computing and IoT, with a focus on acquiring, processing, and utilizing data to provide insights and control actions in the environment.

The course covers key topics such as sensor fusion, data integration, signal processing, machine learning, and on-device or "edge" computation, which are essential for developing intelligent systems that can sense, interpret, and respond to the world around us. It will also explore various applications of these principles across diverse domains such as digital health, human-machine interaction, virtual reality, autonomous vehicles, environmental science, and agriculture.

Throughout the course, students will engage in discussions on recent research articles that present innovative designs, algorithms, and applications for mobile and IoT computing. The course also includes a semester-long course project, where students will have the opportunity to design and build an intelligent system that leverages the principles of mobile computing and IoT to address a real-world problem.


Grading Policy
This class will be graded as follows:
Reading Questions
We will be reviewing and discussing research papers during each lecture. Please read the assigned papers (one for each lecture) before the class and answer the reading questions by the midnight the night before the class (i.e., Sunday 11:59 PM for a Monday lecture and Tuesday 11:59 PM for a Wednesday lecture). Please submit your answers in the gradescope. For Q&A, please join the Ed discussion.

iOS Labs
The labs involve programming for iPhones or iPads in XCode, which requires a Mac for development. We will help loan out Macs and iPads to students who do not have them. The labs will be released gradually.

Course Schedule and Materials
Note: the schedule below is tentative and subject to change. Please check it regularly.
# Date Topic Assigned Reading Reading Questions Slides
1 Mon, Jan 22 Course Introduction & Overview / / slides
2 Wed, Jan 24 Localization: Fundamentals of Localization Chap 6: Fundamentals of Positioning, Wikipedia: GPS.

(1) What is more privacy-preserving: network-based or terminal-based positioning (according to the taxonomy in Fig. 6-2)? Explain in 1 sentence.

(2) Is GPS the former or the latter?

(3) How does a GPS receiver distinguish between the signals received from different satellites?
slides
3 Mon, Jan 29 Localization: Device-based Localization / / slides
4 Wed, Jan 31 Localization: Device-Free Localization & Seeing Through Walls WiTrack

(1) what is the range resolution of FMCW with 5 GHz of bandwidth?

(2) what is the range resolution of acoustic FMCW chirp with 5 kHz of bandwidth?
slides
5 Mon, Feb 5 Localization: Visual Tracking and Localization / / slides
6 Wed, Feb 7 Sensing: Health & Vitals sensing Vital Radio

How is it possible that VitalRadio can capture small chest movement when the range resolution is around 10cm?
slides
7 Mon, Feb 12 Sensing: Inertial Sensors & Inertial Sensing / / slides
8 Wed, Feb 14 Sensing: ML for Wireless Sensing & Sleep Staging / / slides
Mon, Feb 19 No Class: Presidents' Day
9 Wed, Feb 21 Sensing: Through-wall Vision RF pose

How did RFPose leverage loss function typically used in binary classification for keypoint localization?
slides
10 Mon, Feb 26 Connectivity: Network Connectivity / / slides
Mon, Mar 4 No Class: Spring Break
Wed, Mar 6
Wed, Mar 13 Project Proposal Discussion
Sun, Mar 17 Project Proposal   Due: 11:59 PM
11 Mon, Mar 18 Connectivity: Batteryless Connectivity / / slides
Wed, Mar 20 Project Proposal Discussion
12 Mon, Mar 25 Emerging Topics: Security and Privacy / / slides
Wed, Mar 27 Project Meetings
Mon, Apr 1 Project Presentation
Wed, Apr 3 Project Meetings
Mon, Apr 8 Project Presentation
Wed, Apr 10 Project Meetings
13 Mon, Apr 15 Emerging Topics: Space & Agriculture IoT / / slides
Wed, Apr 17 Project Meetings
14 Mon, Apr 22 Emerging Topics: Ocean IoT / / slides
Wed, Apr 24 Project Meetings
Mon, Apr 29 Final Project Presentations
Wed, May 1 No Class: Work on the final project report
Sun, May 12 Final Project Report   Due: 11:59 PM