Tara Hill man awarded €125,000 for research
A Tara Hill man has been awarded €125,000 by the European Union to carry out advanced research on the next generation of communications networks, known as 5G.
Dr Diarmuid Collins, a researcher at the CONNECT Centre in Trinity College Dublin, said when people look at their phones they see 4G on the screen. ‘In CONNECT, we are researching what 5G will be able to do,’ added Mr Collins.
The project is known as WINS-5G and it is part of the 5GINFIRE research programme. It has been funded under the prestigious Horizon 2020 EU fund. Mr Collins will carry out his work as a research fellow at CONNECT, the Science Foundation Ireland centre for future networks.
‘In particular my focus is on data security,’ said Mr Collins. ‘The news is full of stories about data breaches and data protections worries, so this research is an important step towards a safe future.’
Research in this area could make a big difference in the health sector, for instance, where privacy is essential and where sensors will be used increasingly in the future to monitor and manage health. Mr Collins said pacemakers, for example, will need a very secure network connection to transmit data securely to a doctor.
Diarmuid is the eldest son of Flannan and Marian Collins. He graduated with a BSc degree from Waterford Institute of Technology in 2003, followed by a Master’s in Software Engineering and Database Systems from NUI Galway in 2006.