[Paper Review] Internet of Nano, Bio-Nano, Biodegradable and Ingestible Things: A Survey

Şeyda Şentürk, İbrahim Kök+1 more|arXiv (Cornell University)|Feb 24, 2022

Molecular Communication and Nanonetworks4 citations

TL;DR

This survey provides a comprehensive, unified overview of emerging nano-network paradigms—Internet of Nano Things (IoNT), Internet of Bio-Nano Things (IoBNT), Internet of Biodegradable Things (IoBDT), and Internet of Ingestible Things (IoIT)—by synthesizing recent research, architectural models, communication frameworks, and application areas. It identifies critical challenges including bio-cyber interfaces, data management, security, and standards, offering a foundational reference for future research in nanoscale networking.

ABSTRACT

In recent years, advances in biotechnology, nanotechnology and materials science have led to development of revolutionizing applications in Internet of Things (IoT). In particular, the interconnection of nanomaterials, nanoimplants and nanobiosensors with existing IoT networks have inspired the concepts of Internet of Nano Things (IoNT), Internet of Bio-Nano Things (IoBNT), Internet of Biodegradable Things (IoBDT) and Internet of Ingestible Things (IoIT). To date, although there are several survey papers that addressed these concepts separately, there is no current survey covering all studies in IoNT, IoBNT, IoBDT and IoIT. Therefore, in this paper, we provide a complete overview of all recent work in these four areas. Furthermore, we emphasize the research challenges, potential applications, and open research areas.

Motivation & Objective

• To address the lack of comprehensive surveys covering all four emerging nano-network paradigms: IoNT, IoBNT, IoBDT, and IoIT.
• To synthesize recent research on network architectures, communication models, and application domains across these paradigms.
• To identify and analyze key technical challenges such as bio-cyber interfaces, data management, security, and energy constraints.
• To highlight open research issues and future directions for standardization, scalability, and real-world deployment.

Proposed method

• Systematic literature review of recent studies on IoNT, IoBNT, IoBDT, and IoIT from peer-reviewed journals and preprints.
• Categorization of existing works based on application domains, communication modes, and network architecture.
• Analysis of communication challenges including biological noise, limited bandwidth, and non-OSI-compliant protocols in nano-environments.
• Evaluation of proposed standards, security mechanisms, and data handling techniques in nano-networks.
• Identification of gaps in current research through comparative analysis of existing survey papers (Table I).
• Synthesis of open issues across all paradigms, including energy harvesting, mobility, and integration with next-gen technologies like blockchain and SDN.

Experimental results

Research questions

• RQ1 What are the core architectural models and communication structures in IoNT, IoBNT, IoBDT, and IoIT?
• RQ2 How do the unique environmental and physical constraints of biological and nanoscale environments affect nano-communication?
• RQ3 What are the major challenges in data management, security, and privacy across these emerging nano-networks?
• RQ4 What are the current limitations in bio-cyber interface development and how do they impact real-world deployment?
• RQ5 What future research directions are most critical for enabling scalable, secure, and interoperable nano-network ecosystems?

Key findings

• No existing survey comprehensively covers all four paradigms—IoNT, IoBNT, IoBDT, and IoIT—making this survey the first to unify them.
• Nano-networks face significant challenges due to biological noise, limited bandwidth, and non-standardized communication protocols, rendering traditional OSI/TCP models unsuitable.
• Security and privacy are major concerns, with high threat surfaces due to the sensitivity of biomedical and personal data in nano-networks.
• Current bio-cyber interfaces are not yet clinically viable, requiring generalized and realistic deployment frameworks.
• Data management and smart data analysis on nano-scale devices remain underdeveloped, with a need for lightweight, on-device algorithms.
• Integration with emerging technologies like blockchain, SDN, and NFTs is still nascent but represents a promising future research direction.