The Convergence of Control, Communication, and Computation

The convergence of communication and computation over the past two decades has given us the Internet. We believe that the next phase of the information technology revolution will be the convergence of control, communication, and computation. This will provide the ability for large numbers of sensors, actuators, and computational units, all interconnected wirelessly or over wires, to interact with the physical environment. We argue that in the proliferation of this “convergence,” a critical role will be played by the architecture. We describe an experimental Convergence Testbed at the University of Illinois, outline the architectural challenges, and our efforts in this direction.