Title: Programming Spatial Computers

Speaker: Jake Beal

Place: 	32-G531
Time: 	1-2:30pm
Date: 	Friday, October 20, 2006

Abstract:

  Space-filling computers are an emerging problem across a wide range
  of disciplines---sensor networks, biofilms, FPGAs, morphogenesis,
  swarm robotics, etc.  A typical spatial computer is composed of a
  vast number of unreliable parts, and we need programming tools that
  can marshal them effectively to produce robust aggregate behavior.
  The amorphous medium abstraction enables this by breaking the task
  into three loosely coupled subproblems: global programs for a
  continuous space, a global to local compiler, and emulation of
  continuous space by a discrete network.  We have implemented these
  ideas with our language Proto, and have begun applying it in the
  areas of sensor networks and reconfigurable robotics, both in
  simulation and on Mica2 Motes.