Volume 2 Issue 1, January 2019

Victor Bahl, Distinguished Scientist and Director of Mobility and Networking Research at Microsoft, tells Nature Electronics about the future of edge computing.

Different Internet of Things (IoT) applications demand different levels of intelligence and efficiency in processing data. Multi-tier computing, which integrates cloud, fog and edge computing technologies, will be required in order to deliver future IoT services.

Europe’s data protection laws must evolve to guard against pervasive inferential analytics in nascent digital technologies such as edge computing.

A nanolithography technique that uses a heated scanning probe tip can precisely pattern metal electrodes on two-dimensional semiconductors, creating field-effect transistors with exceptional performance.

The compressive buckling of lithographically defined, two-dimensional patterns can create three-dimensional piezoelectric microsystems with a range of potential applications.

Thermal scanning probe lithography can be used to pattern metal electrodes in direct contact with monolayer MoS₂, creating field-effect transistors that exhibit vanishing Schottky barrier heights, high on/off ratios of 10¹⁰, no hysteresis, and subthreshold swings as low as 64 mV per decade.

Nonlinear buckling processes can be used to transform thin films of piezoelectric polymers into sophisticated 3D piezoelectric microsystems with applications in energy harvesting, multifunctional sensing and bio-integrated devices.

Perfect orthogonality can be imposed on wireless communication channels by using reconfigurable metasurfaces to tune the disorder of their propagation environment.

Edge computing processes data on infrastructure that is located close to the point of data creation. Mahadev Satyanarayanan recounts how recognition of the potential limitations of centralized, cloud-based processing led to this new approach to computing.