The recent progress in nanotechnology has motivated researchers to study the concept of nano-communication networks, i.e. networks that enable communication between nano-scale devices. Since one of the main deployment areas of nano-scale machinery is expected to be in healthcare related applications within the human body, conventional methodologies for wireless communication involving radio frequency transmission are considered as impractical for such networks due to physical constraints of both the propagation channel and the nanoscale nodes. Molecular communication, inspired by the naturally evolved communication mechanisms between biological entities at this physical scale, is a very promising cutting-edge approach to this problem, where dedicated molecules are employed as information carriers.

Health monitoring can be counted amongst the most highly-anticipated applications of nano-scale networks, since this technology presents the potential to enable a quantum jump in the early detection capabilities of potentially lethal diseases and disorders. In this context, the problem of abnormality detection, i.e. the early and accurate detection and reporting of abnormal changes in the environmental parameters that may characterize the presence of a disease or disorder, represents one of the key challenges.

The main aim of this project is to investigate the abnormality detection problem in nano-scale networks employing molecular communication. The research will be focusing on the development of system models for the abnormality detection problem in the molecular communication channel, and on the design of novel communication and signal processing strategies for the detection task, taking into account the energy, memory and processing power restrictions of the nano-scale nodes. Performance analysis of the proposed schemes will be carried out analytically and/or via simulations.

The University of Sussex is a top 20 university in the UK. The Sensor Technology Research Centre is a world-leading group in theoretical and applied research in the areas of sensors, wearable and embedded technologies, mobile and wireless communications and extreme environment detectors (for further information visit http://www.sussex.ac.uk/strc/). The successful applicant will be joining an international collaboration with overseas partners, who are excellent and accomplished researchers in their respective fields.