This is important research for PMC’s and PSC’s, because if companies want a simple way for contractors to communicate with each other on some disaster zone or war zone gig, then this will allow them to do that. Especially since most guys have, or will soon have smart phones that are bluetooth and wifi capable. You could add this capability to your communications plan, and if these guys can make this open source and free, then it would be a no-brainer to utilize Mesh Networks.
In disaster zones and war zones where there is no infrastructure for 3G or cell towers, or those things were destroyed somehow, you must have a communications infrastructure back up system. Mesh Networks is a possible solution if they can pull it off. To make it free is even cooler, because then it will not be something that is exclusive to one company or another. Along with the Mesh Networks, there must also be a way to encrypt the communications or something, and I am sure some technology will come along to do such a thing. But first things first–get the Mesh Networks going.
And for military/police/medical/disaster response crews, this will be awesome. For coordinating purposes and for evolving incidents like the Mumbai attack, you must have communications and information sharing systems that have redundancy built into them. If terrorists or some flood destroys the cell tower(s), then you must have an alternative network for everyone to talk on. This is smart and I wish them all the luck in their research. –Matt
—————————————————————–
Researchers developing free mobile mesh network
Munir Kotadia
Oct 1, 2009
Can provide comms during mobile network blackout?
Researchers from Australia and Singapore are developing a wireless ad-hoc mesh networking technology that uses mobile handsets to share and carry information including high quality video.
The mesh network will make use of Bluetooth or Wifi and could be used at a large sporting event, conference, or even a crowded city centre during an emergency, to swap information between handsets – even if the mobile phone network was offline.
