Project-based approach in teaching energy-harvesting wireless sensor networks

Use of project-based approaches in engineering education is widely acknowledged. Experiments are a significant part of research and they are also very rewarding when used in teaching. In particular, for complex and higher level undergraduate courses, as well as graduate courses project-based teaching promises to enhance the learning experience. Teaching wireless sensor networks (WSNs) in undergraduate level is challenging and can benefit from testbeds. As the cost of hardware and testbeds are declining, there is a good opportunity to demonstrate the abstract notion of computer communication protocols using testbeds. In that sense, energy harvesting wireless sensor networks is a fairly new technology and can be effectively learnt by using testbeds. In this paper, we present our work-in-progress in integrating a state-of the art energy harvesting kit for the purpose of teaching Radio Frequency (RF) energy harvesting concept. The observations on the testbed lead to promising future directions that can help integrate WSNs into STEM education.