IoT Research and Innovation Service

The IoT Research Service provides a dedicated Edinburgh-wide Low Power Wide Area Network (LPWAN) with a centralized data collection and visualisation facility that can be accessed via a web portal. The service is available for students and researchers at the University of Edinburgh to experiment with IoT devices, smart applications and real-time data analytics, and provides a robust and secure “sensor to insight” platform.

The initial IoT research Service network is based on LoRaWAN, a secure long range (approx. 2km–20km) and low power radio communications technology, that uses the unlicensed spectrum (in the UK, the 868MHz band) for message broadcast by small battery-powered sensor devices.

The following diagram illustrates how data will flow from sensors through to an analysis and visualisation server:

We have installed multiple LoRaWAN gateway radio receivers across the University estate in central Edinburgh, including at Easter Bush and the BioQuarter. Our current network coverage map shows where suitable LoRa-enabled devices will have connectivity in Edinburgh.

Our network facility will expand in the near future to extend LoRaWAN coverage further across Edinburgh. It will also provide dedicated IoT WiFi, enabling miulti-modal communications for devices. In future, we plan to support additional emerging IoT communication technologies.

The IoT Research Service staff can help you design and implement your project. This includes guidance on writing a Privacy Impact Assessment (for GDPR compliance); selection of IoT devices/sensors; embedded programming; and data modelling and applied data science. Please contact us to enquire about using this service.