Distribuerat Infrastrukturstöd för Backscatternätverk
- Diarienummer
- FID20-0048
- Projektledare
- Ben Abdesslem, Fehmi
- Start- och slutdatum
- 220101-261231
- Beviljat belopp
- 2 500 000 kr
- Förvaltande organisation
- RISE SICS
- Forskningsområde
- Informations-, kommunikations- och systemteknik
Summary
Existing battery-powered Internet of Things devices suffer from premature battery depletion. Given the large expected number of deployed devices, batteries can be labor intensive and carry significant environmental impact due to the resulting chemical waste. Backscatter communication is an alternative to conventional radios, which account for the largest part of the energy consumption of current IoT devices. By offloading critical functions to an external entity, backscatter devices can achieve sufficiently low power consumption to operate entirely on energy harvested from the environment; thus greatly simplifying maintenance of deployed devices. However, large scale backscatter communication systems depend on external infrastructure for operation. We seek to develop methods for the distributed coordination of this infrastructure to ensure reliable and dependable backscatter-based IoT applications while maintaining high spectral efficiency, in particular in large scale scenarios where the infrastructure collaboratively serves multiple backscatter devices. Specifically, the project has the following main goals: - Developing discovery and coexistence methods for backscatter nodes. - Develop methods for coordination among infrastructure nodes for optimizing spectrum efficiency and communication range for backscatter devices. - Distributed MIMO-like cooperation among infrastructure nodes to provide the necessary support for backscatter nodes.
Populärvetenskaplig beskrivning
Existing battery-powered Internet of Things (IoT) devices suffer from premature battery depletion. Given the large expected number of deployed devices, replacing batteries can be labor intensive and carry significant environmental impact due to the resulting chemical waste. Backscatter communication is an alternative to conventional radios, which account for the largest part of the energy consumption of current IoT devices. Backscatter devices can achieve sufficiently low power consumption to operate without batteries, relying instead on energy harvested from the environment; thus greatly simplifying maintenance of deployed devices. The drawback of backscatter communications is that they depend on external signals provided by supporting infrastructure. Supplying these signals in a way that is resource efficient and that does not cause undue disruptions to other networks operating nearby while guaranteeing reliable and dependable operation of the backscatter devices is a challenging and largely unexplored problem. In this project, we will develop a system in which an operator can deploy several base stations to provide the necessary support for battery-free backscatter devices over a certain area. These base stations will have the task of coordinating among themselves to collaboratively provide the necessary support for the backscatter nodes in the best possible way, minimizing usage of precious limited resources. The base stations will also take the role of gateways between the battery-free devices and the wider internet. With this system we will not only enable future large scale data collection applications that are more cost effective and sustainable, but also enable novel applications that are not possible with today’s battery-powered devices. Imagine, for example, sensors placed in hard to reach locations where battery replacement is impractical. This is the case, for instance, of sensors embedded in concrete in civil infrastructure or in medical implanted devices.