There are billions of mobile devices across the planet. They come in many shapes, sizes and capabilities. The picture below shows the state of smartphone computing as of a few years ago. The random assortment of rectangles represents the rich diversity in Android devices.
Despite the rich proliferation of mobile devices, all mobile devices struggle to deliver high computational capability because they are limited by battery density and capacity, and stringent thermal envelopes. The group's mobile computing research effort focuses on tackling these hard problems involving holistic mobile system design. We develop high-performance mobile computing systems, the kind that can usher in next-generation applications such as perceptual computing and augmented reality. But the buck does not stop there. Using mobile devices also exposes us to security issues. Mobile malware is a persistent problem that is widespread. So, we also study how to build secure systems that do not compromise system efficiency.
The research takes an integrated look at the whole mobile computing stack, from the application user down to the hardware. The solution space that we explore involves (1) tuning the software stack to utilize existing hardware better; (2) designing future hardware with the software and algorithms in mind; and (3) taking into account user quality of experience (QoE).