Rahul Bhattacharyya

Education

Institution	Degree	G.P.A	Year
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India	B.Tech + M.Tech Integrated Dual Degree in Civil Engineering	9.62 / 10.00	2006
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA	PhD in Civil and Environmental Engineering	4.9 / 5.0	(expected) Fall 2011

Research Interests

I am interested in investigating how sensing technology can be used to enhance the understanding of our environment allowing us to accurately predict state, correct anomalies and optimally allocate limited resources. As part of my research, I am focusing on the development of ultra-low cost wireless sensor nodes which can be pervasively deployed in environments where there is a need for large scale sensing. I evaluate possible sensor node designs in terms of reliability of sensor response, robustness to changes in the environment of deployment, fabrication costs and trade-offs in functionality.

As part of my PhD dissertation, my goal is to design 10 cent wireless sensors using the RFID tag antenna as a sensing mechanism . I have developed, or am in the process of developing, RFID based strain and displacement sensors for deployment in infrastructure asset management, temperature threshold sensors for quality assurance of perishable produce in the cold supply chain,  fluid level sensors for application in the service industry and a host of other sensing modalities in application domains that would significantly benefit from large scale sensor deployment.

My undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering, Master's degree in Structural Engineering and PhD experience in sensor design and RFID have provided me with a complementary set of skills that I leverage to identify sensing opportunities and possible solution methodologies. I have gathered experience in Structural Design, Transportation Engineering, Optimization, Numerical Simulation, Choice Modeling, Computer Programming, Machine Learning, Signal Processing and other tools that I frequently use for analysis in my research. 

Awards and Honors

1. Silver Medal, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, August 2006.
2. Prabhakar D. Mahajan, Institute Heritage Fellowship, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, 2005.
3. Schoettler Fellowship, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, MIT, September 2006 - January 2007.

Professional Experience

1. Poster Session Chair, Organizing Committee for the  IEEE International Conference on RFID , Orlando FL, 2010.
2. Publicity Chair, Organizing Committee for the IEEE International Conference on RFID, Orlando FL, 2011.
3. Technical Program Committee,IEEE International Conference on RFID, Orlando FL, 2011.
4. Catalyst, RFID Tag Antenna-Based Sensing, Innovation Teams, MIT Entrepreneurship Center, MIT, February - May 2010.
5. Frequent Reviewer for the IEEE International Conference on RFID.
6. Summer Internship, Intelligent Sensing for Innovative Infrastructure (ISIS) Research Network, University of Manitoba, Canada, May - July 2004.

Publications

Conference Publications

1. R. Bhattacharyya, C. Floerkemeier and S. Sarma, “Towards Tag Antenna Based Sensing – An RFID Displacement Sensor”, Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on RFID, 2009, pp 95-102.
2. R. Bhattacharyya, C. Floerkemeier and S. Sarma, “Tag Antenna Based Temperature Sensing”, Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on RFID, 2010, pp 8-15.
3. R. Bhattacharyya, C. Floerkemeier and S. Sarma, “RFID Tag Antenna Based Sensing: Does your Beverage Glass need a Refill?”, Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on RFID,2010, pp 126-133.
4. R. Bhattacharyya, C.V Di Leo, C. Floerkemeier, S. Sarma and L. Anand, "RFID Tag Antenna Based Temperature Sensing using Shape Memory Polymer Actuation ",  IEEE Sensors Conference 2010 ,pp 2363-2368.s 
5. R. Bhattacharyya, D. Deavours, C. Floerkemeier and S. Sarma, "Tag Antenna Based Sensing in the Frequency Domain", Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on RFID, 2011, pp 70-77. 

Journal Publications

1. R. Bhattacharyya, C. Floerkemeier and S. Sarma, “Low-Cost, Ubiquitous RFID-Tag Antenna Based Sensing ”, Proceedings of the IEEE - RFID: A Unique Radio Innovation for the 21st Century , Vol.98 No.9, 2010, pp 1593-1600.

Workshop Publications

1. C. Floerkemeier, R. Bhattacharyya and S. Sarma, “Beyond the ID in RFID ”, The Internet of Things, Springer NY 2010,  pp 219-227.

Poster Competitions

1.  “Towards Tag Antenna Based Sensing – An RFID Displacement Sensor”, Leaders for Manufacturing Programme Summit, MIT 2009 (Second Position ).
2.   “Tag Antenna Based Temperature Sensing”,  Leaders for Manufacturing Programme Summit, MIT 2010.

News Articles

C. Floerkemeier and R. Bhattacharyya, Towards a Cheap Sensor Tag, RFID Journal, October 1, 2010.

Invited Talks