Research and Education in IoT: My Humble Contributions, Experiences and the Road Ahead

In this talk, I feel privileged and honoured to share my experiences contributing to the research and education of Internet of Things (IoT), alongside the advances that have been made to the field globally. IoT is the ubiquitous technology behind the smart revolution of the present day. By enabling everyday ‘things’ and objects to be connected to the backbone internetwork, IoT, along with its allied technologies such as cloud computing, ML and fog computing, is truly a social revolution, where every animate and inanimate object come to ‘life’. Along with my many co-researchers and scholars, with whom I have been fortunate enough to work, my contributions on IoT have focused on enriching both the academia as well as the industry and society through research, teaching and outreach activities. Few of the promising applications of IoT where I have concentrated are those in smart healthcare, smart agriculture, smart industries and smart education. The several solutions proposed by me and my team are aimed at solving critical issues of the said domains through the use of IoT and bridging key gaps using smart communication technologies. Concepts such as sensor virtualization and sensor cloud have thrown open new areas of research for academicians and educators alike. In fact, for the last few years, I have been heavily engaged in imparting technical education in IoT, both through short term courses and online courses as well as full semester credit courses to different levels of candidates, UG, PG, Ph. D, working professionals and any interested persons. Of special mention are two of my courses on IoT and Industrial IoT offered twice a year over the NPTEL platform, which sees enormous participation and enrolments from the learners. The said courses have helped a large number of students and professionals alike to learn about IoT at various levels. Bright and motivated students are also offered internships on various IoT projects at my laboratory at IIT Kharagpur, where they experiment on real-world problems and gain practical skills on IoT and sensor technologies. Recently, I have focused my research towards green technologies and energy efficiency in IoT as well, with the aim of providing sustainable technologies for the smarter future. As an educator, I feel that the amalgamation of IoT with education principles and pedagogy accelerates us towards a promising digital revolution in teaching principles. IoT-based smart education empowers the creation of personalized, interactive, and adaptive learning experiences for the students as well as tailor-made teaching practices for the educators alike. I have been fortunate enough to utilize some of the advanced technologies in my teaching. Educators can design their curricula based on the competency and abilities of the students, which is especially beneficial for students with special abilities. No fixed and rigid pedagogy is applicable anymore, rather it has to be dynamic and evolving. In my teaching, I do not restrict myself to only the theory, but I always continuously engage the students with practical IoT testbeds and DIY kits which offer holistic learning. Technology-assisted learning is the next big thing in education being adopted globally, and IoT serves as the backbone behind its successful implementation.