Detroit is playing a role in molding the future shape and use of the Internet thanks to a couple of federal grants being put to work at Wayne State University.
WSU researchers Hongwei Zhang (an assistant professor of computer science) and Patrick Gossman (deputy chief information officer for special projects) received a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to build an experimental wireless networking infrastructure for research, education and application exploration. This new network will focus on providing faster high-speed Internet service wirelessly over large geographic areas.
"It's difficult to predict when this will come but we know it's coming," Prof Zhang says. "It's not coming tomorrow but it's coming."
Zhang and another Wayne State researcher, Le Yi Wang, are also working a $900,000 federal grant to use similar advanced wireless Internet technology to improve vehicle transportation. This new system would allow for vehicles to be operated and controlled as groups instead of individually.
Source: Hongwei Zhang, assistant professor of computer science at Wayne State University
Writer: Jon Zemke
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