Making sensors smart

Kang Lee is the chair of TC-9, the measurement sensor technology technical committee of the IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Society, and he is also the leader of the Sensor Development and Application Group of the Manufacturing Engineering Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Gaithersburg, MD. As the chair of TC-9, Lee is spearheading the effort to develop IEEE 1451, "Standard for a Smart Transducer Interface for Sensors and Actuators—Common Functions, Communication Protocols, and Transducer Electronic Data Sheet (TEDS) Formats." TC-9's latest effort is IEEE P1451.5, which seeks to add wireless protocols to this suite of standards.

Kang Lee chairs the IEEE Test and Measurement Society's TC-9, which is responsible for the IEEE 1451 family of "smart sensor" standards.

Q. Tell me a little bit about TC-9 and its mission.

A. TC-9's mission is to develop, promote, and support standards for specifying and characterizing the performance of sensors, sensor interfaces, and sensor networks, and for specifying their associated measurement methods, recommended test practices, and conformance tests.

Q. The IEEE 1451 series, also known as the "smart sensor" standards, are probably the most well-known of the standards that TC-9 is responsible for. What's new with IEEE 1451?

A. Currently, we are working on IEEE P1451.5. The IEEE P1451.5 Study Group is studying the feasibility of developing a wireless communication interface specification for communicating TEDS data and digital sensor data. The study group has already submitted a proposal to IEEE-SA to form a working group to develop such a standard. We expect the IEEE to approve the proposal and we will then form a working group to develop the draft standard.

Q. Tell me a little bit about IEEE 1588 and what's going on with that standard.

A. IEEE 1588, "IEEE Standard for a Precision Clock Synchronization Protocol for Networked Measurement and Control Systems," is now an approved standard. It defines a protocol enabling precise synchronization of clocks in measurement and control systems implemented with technologies such as network communication, local computing, and distributed objects.

NIST is sponsoring a workshop on IEEE 1588 on September 24, and some companies are already implementing the standard. One company, for example, recently announced plans to add time synchronization services for real-time control applications based on IEEE 1588.

Q. How can interested engineers get involved in the activities of TC-9? Are only IEEE members eligible to participate?

A. We have seven standard working groups, six for the IEEE 1451 family of standards and one for IEEE 1588. All are active in one form or another and hold workshops, demos, and meetings. Anyone interested in participating in any of the working group activities can contact me at kang.lee@nist.gov.