Designing Intelligent Energy Harvesting Communication Systems

From being a scientific curiosity only a few years ago, energy harvesting (EH) is well on its way to becoming a game-changing technology in the field of autonomous wireless networked systems. The promise of long-term, uninterrupted and self-sustainable operation in a diverse array of applications has captured the interest of academia and industry alike. Yet the road to the ultimate network of perpetual communicating devices is plagued with potholes: ambient energy is intermittent and scarce, energy storage capacity is limited, and devices are constrained in size and complexity. In dealing with these challenges, this article will cover recent developments in the design of intelligent energy management policies for EH wireless devices and discuss pressing research questions in this rapidly growing field.