discussion / Sensors  / 16 March 2019

What are people using IoT for?

Groups

Hi everyone. I'm curious how people are using IoT in the wildlife community. Are you using local wireless sensor networks to a gateway? Sensors connected to cellular radios? Sensors connected to satellite radios? If you have a project or case study, I'd love to hear about it. Or post a link below :)

Akiba




Hi Akiba,

I haven't found a groundbreaking use yet but am looking hard for any person detection solution to use in anti-poaching. I can't believe that someone hasn't made something like this yet as IoT fits so well for this use case. If you hear of anything let me know! 

Hi Dexter, Akiba,

I've been looking into just that, intruder detection.  What I'm considering isn't exactly IOT, it's a remote control system of the sort often used as garage door openers, so it's quite a bit more primitive.  The features look very suitable for a detection system consisting of a central receiver and multiple dumb peripheral trip-wire type of sensors.  The transmitters are simple enough that often no MCU is necessary, just a switch or an open drain.

If anyone wants to work on this, I'm happy to have this cup pass from me!

Hit me up, -harold

Hi Akiba, 

I've been using IoT technology to aggregate and upload data from remote sensors to save field researchers the time and effort of collecting data manually. The sensors send data to each other at regular intervals and then upload it to the internet either through a WiFi router or satellite depending on the scenario. Although the project isn't technically IoT since most sensors talk to each other rather than the WiFi router, it uses the same hardware to form a wireless sensor network. Currently targetting our first deployment for Madagascar in December 2021. Would love to talk with other people working in this space.

Eric

Hi Akiba

We use LoRa as well, and we're current trying to implement Swarm for satellite communications. So your sensors all talk directly to an internet connected device? Are your gateways expensive? 

Right now, we don't have WiFi close to our field site, so we're using some LoRa (PHY layer only) relays to bridge the collection site to the WiFi gateway. Will definitely keep you updated with problems we encounter with the deployment. Do you have any general advice for setting up a network?

Eric