While smart dust* is not here yet, smaller, faster and cheaper technology has reached the point where sensors may soon be as powerful as tiny computers.

One example: Intel is developing RFID technology that adds an accelerometer and programmable chip in a millimeter-sized package, powered by ambient radio power from television, FM radio and WiFi networks.

* Tiny digital sensors, strewn around the globe, gathering information and communicating with powerful computer networks to monitor, measure and understand the physical world