Seamless communication soon possible even in crisis situations?

Scientists from IDLab, a core imec research group embedded in the universities of Ghent and Antwerp, are working on an innovative system for wireless networks to enable smooth communication even in crisis situations. DARPA, the American Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, recently awarded the IDLab project 750 000 dollars. The prestigious DARPA challenges are global competitions in which teams of researchers work around a specific theme to overcome a problem that affects the entire world. The team that develops the best solution to a specific technological challenge is awarded the DARPA cash prize, enabling them to develop their technology further. One challenge at the end of the 1960s, for example, was to connect computers with each other. This produced the ARPANET, the predecessor of the Internet as we know it today. More recently, the DARPA Grand Challenge also sparked the idea for Google's self-driving car.