July 25, 2001 Research Subcommittee Committee on Science U.S. House of Representatives There are a number of scientific disciplines in need of wireless Internet access in remote areas without any supporting infrastructure such as AC power, telephone or wired computer communications. One example in the field of seismology is the real-time monitoring of earthquake activity. My group at the University of California at San Diego operates the ANZA seismic network to make measurements of earthquakes for providing information to federal, state, and local governmental emergency services organizations about current seismic activity in southern California. In addition, we also provide high quality data to scientific researchers. The ANZA network provides data within ten seconds of real-time to other regional networks and the US National Seismic Network, and provides near real-time information to the greater San Diego community. In order to provide Internet access to remote field sites where our seismologists are collecting and processing data, we are building upon existing point-to-point wireless Internet links. In the current configuration, a dedicated digital microwave link connects Toro Peak in southern California to the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) at Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) via a repeater on Mt. Soledad (Figure 1). Real-time seismic data are sent over wireless asynchronous serial lines to a data concentrator, which converts data into TCP/IP packets and retransmits these data to IGPP for processing. This example of data collection for seismology is typical of all earth sciences (geosciences, environmental science, and ecology), some areas of biological sciences, as well as other disciplines. Normally data collection sites are located in remote areas, with difficult or limited access, and no available power or communications infrastructure. This remote access dilemma is known as the "Last Kilometer Problem." The continuing explosive development in low power Internet-based data acquisition and telemetry systems, solar panel technology, and wireless Internet capability leads to the possibility of a radically different system design. This new design starts with the assumption that all autonomous remote field stations are Internet nodes. To connect each node to the Internet will require low power radios which operate in the unlicensed 902-928 MHZ and 2.4-2.5 GHz spread spectrum bands. The limitation of these spread spectrum bands is that their frequency ranges require direct line-of-sight in order to work. To accommodate this "last kilometer" constraint we are installing network nodes at several selected mountain peaks that have existing structures with excellent aerial coverage. This NSF sponsored project is known as the High Performance Wireless Research and Education Network (HPWREN). The large yellow triangles in Figure 1 connected with black or red lines show the existing infrastructure currently used by the principal investigators to begin this project. These network nodes provide line-of-site coverage throughout Riverside, San Diego, and Imperial counties in southernmost California. The fundamental change in the way we conduct science by using the NSF sponsored HPWREN project is to make the jump into a truly real-time environment. By being able to continuously monitor sensors and process data in real-time, we are able to immediately respond to dynamic changes in the environment. If a significant earthquake occurs in our region, we can quickly deploy additional sensors in the epicentral region, evaluate the data, and continue to adapt the station locations to maximize the scientific data return. This is especially important when some or all of the sensors need to be placed at remote sites. The ability to adapt environmental monitoring systems to significant transient events will be of great benefit to all field sciences. Dr. Frank Vernon Director of Seismic Networks and Arrays Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics