Optical Indoor Positioning System Based on TFT Technology

A novel indoor positioning system is presented in the paper. Similarly to the camera-based solutions, it is based on visual detection, but it conceptually differs from the classical approaches. First, the objects are marked by LEDs, and second, a special sensing unit is applied, instead of a camera, to track the motion of the markers. This sensing unit realizes a modified pinhole camera model, where the light-sensing area is fixed and consists of a small number of sensing elements (photodiodes), and it is the hole that can be moved. The markers are tracked by controlling the motion of the hole, such that the light of the LEDs always hits the photodiodes. The proposed concept has several advantages: Apart from its low computational demands, it is insensitive to the disturbing ambient light. Moreover, as every component of the system can be realized by simple and inexpensive elements, the overall cost of the system can be kept low

Design and implementation of a light-based IoT (LIoT) node using printed electronics

Abstract. The recent exponential growth of new radio frequency (RF) based applications such as internet of things (IoT) technology is creating a huge bandwidth demand in the already congested RF spectrum. Meanwhile, visible light communication (VLC) is emerging as a technology which can be used as an alternative wireless communications solution which makes no use of the radio spectrum. In addition, continuously powering up the massively deployed IoT nodes is becoming a challenge when it comes to maintenance costs. Development of energy autonomous IoT nodes would certainly assist to solve the energy challenge. Previous work shows that renewable energy sources can be utilized to address the energy requirement of IoT nodes. Under this context, we have developed a light-based energy autonomous IoT (LIoT) prototype. This thesis presents a feasibility study and proof of concept of LIoT, including design, implementation and validation of LIoT nodes and a transmitter unit. Furthermore, the ability of multiuser communication using VLC as well as indoor light-based energy harvesting were demonstrated and tested in this thesis. To make the concept of LIoT more attractive from an implementation standpoint, and to create a future-looking solution, printed electronics (PE) technology was used as a part of the implementation. Two key components of the prototype were based on PE technology, photovoltaic cells used to harvest energy, and displays used to exhibit information transmitted to the LIoT node. In the future, when PE technology becomes more mature, very low-cost, small form-factor and environmentally friendly LIoT nodes could be implemented on thin substrates. A wide array of possible applications can be created combining the concept of light-based IoT with printed electronics. The proposed LIoT concept shows great promise as an enabling technology for 6G

Improved Visible Light Communication Receiver Performance by Leveraging the Spatial Dimension

In wireless communications systems, signals can be transmitted as time (temporal) or spatial variants across 3D space, and in both ways. However, using temporal variant communication channels in high-speed data transmission introduces inter-symbol interference (ISI) which makes the systems unreliable. On the other hand, spatial diversity in signal processing reduces the ISI and improves the system throughput or performance by allowing more signals from different spatial locations at the same time. Therefore, the spatial features or properties of visible light signals can be very useful in designing a reliable visible light communication (VLC) system with higher system throughput and making it more robust against ambient noise and interference. By allowing only the signals of interest, spatial separability in VLC can minimize the noise to a greater extent to improve signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) which can ensure higher data rates (in the order of Gbps-Tbps) in VLC. So, designing a VLC system with spatial diversity is an exciting area to explore and might set the foundation for future VLC system architectures and enable different VLC based applications such as vehicular VLC, multi-VLC, localization, and detection using VLC, etc. This thesis work is motivated by the fundamental challenges in reusing spatial information in VLC systems to increase the system throughput or gain through novel system designing and their prototype implementations

Software Porting of a 3D Reconstruction Algorithm to Razorcam Embedded System on Chip

A method is presented to calculate depth information for a UAV navigation system from Keypoints in two consecutive image frames using a monocular camera sensor as input and the OpenCV library. This method was first implemented in software and run on a general-purpose Intel CPU, then ported to the RazorCam Embedded Smart-Camera System and run on an ARM CPU onboard the Xilinx Zynq-7000. The results of performance and accuracy testing of the software implementation are then shown and analyzed, demonstrating a successful port of the software to the RazorCam embedded system on chip that could potentially be used onboard a UAV with tight constraints of size, weight, and power. The potential impacts will be seen through the continuation of this research in the Smart ES lab at University of Arkansas

INFRARED COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS FOR THE NAVIGATION IN INDOOR ENVIRONMENTS

The navigation systems are widely diffused in various fields of application. The most popular navigation system is well known as Global Positioning System (GPS): it is used essentially in an outdoor environment, due to the fact that the buildings introduce an extremely high attenuation to the satellite signals. In order to provide a navigation service inside the buildings, it is necessary to implement a communication system capable to retrieve the user\u2019s position and to deliver the navigation data in an appropriate format. This thesis describes the architecture of a navigation system for people that need to be guided through indoor environments, e.g., public buildings, hospitals, where orientation is very critical. The system has to provide both navigation and context aware information to people that may be in difficult emotive state as it happens to patients and visitors in a hospital. As it is widely explained in the whole thesis, the communication system uses an InfraRed (IR) optical link, thus a general overview to the IR light, and the modulations used in the optical communication systems is given. Moreover, one of the main topic of this thesis is to illustrate a complete study of the optimized architecture suitable to navigate an user inside a building. The IR navigation system developed in this thesis has stemmed out from a first reverse engineering step where an existing IR analog solution suited to transmit only voice signals has been analyzed. A number of tests have been carried out to characterize the existing analog solution, the modulation used (FM) and its main parameters. The need to have a new digital communication system is suggested by the possibility to improve the performance, developing a numerical transmission architecture: this allows to identify and, consequently, to locate an user. In this thesis a complete study on the feasibility of the digital architecture is proposed. All the technical details and justifications will be illustrated and discussed, including the study made upon the analog solution, keeping always in mind the need to maintain the compatibility with the analog solution. The thesis will also illustrate the development of the analog blocks that compose both transmission Front End and reception Front End. A particular attention will be paid to the Front End implemented on the receiver device, where the Received Signal Strength (RSS) value is needed. In fact, the user must point the receiver device to the transmitter illuminator as directly as possible (the : to do it correctly, a visual (or audible) indication of the RSS could be useful. Since the receiver device must be pointed in direction of the illuminator, it should be useful to understand if the system\u2019s performance in an indoor environment could be corrupted by the reflections of the IR beams: these reflections are caused by the walls, windows or any other reflective surfaces. This effect, called multipath is taken into account: a generic analytical expression of the total received signal will be derived, and a simulation of the performance degeneration will be shown. Finally, the implementation of a working prototype is presented, with the focus on the user interface. The navigation system has been installed at the Oncology Reference Center (CRO) hospital in Aviano (Italy), in the framework of the EasyMob project. The EasyMob project will be introduced in this thesis, giving an overview about the entire set of technologies used to navigate an user into a confined space (e.g., colored visible light path guides and Thin Film Transistor (TFT) displays). Moreover a deep study on a number of IR navigation architectures is given, illustrating pros and cons of the infrastructure chosen and explained in the whole thesis

OLEDs AND E-PAPER. Disruptive Potential for the European Display Industry

DG ENTR and JRC/IPTS of the European Commission have launched a series of studies to analyse prospects of success for European ICT industries with respect to emerging technologies. This report concerns display technologies (Organic Light Emitting Diodes and Electronic Paper - or OLEDs and e-paper for short). It assesses whether these technologies could be disruptive, and how well placed EU firms would be to take advantage of this disruption In general, displays are an increasingly important segment of the ICT sector. Since the 1990s and following the introduction of flat panel displays (FPDs), the global display industry has grown dramatically. The market is now (2009) worth about ¿ 100 billion. Geo-politically, the industry is dominated by Asian suppliers, with European companies relegated to a few vertical niches and parts of the value chain (e.g. research, supply of material and equipment). However, a number of new technologies are entering the market, e.g. OLEDs and electronic paper. Such emerging technologies may provide an opportunity for European enterprises to (re-)enter or strengthen their competitive position. OLEDs are composed of polymers that emit light when a current is passed through them. E-paper, on the other hand, is a portable, reusable storage and display medium, typically thin and flexible. Both OLEDs and e-paper have the potential to disrupt the existing displays market, but it is still too soon to say with certainty whether this will occur and when. Success for OLEDs depends on two key technical advances: first, the operating lifetime, and second, the production process. E-paper has a highly disruptive potential since it opens the door to new applications, largely text-based, not just in ICTs but also in consumer goods, pictures and advertising that could use its key properties. It could also displace display technologies that offer text-reading functions in ICT terminals such as tablet notebooks. There are three discrete segments in the OLED value chain where any discontinuity could offer EU firms the opportunity to play a more significant part in the displays sector: (1) original R&D and IPR for devices and for the manufacturing process and material supply/verification; (2) bulk materials for manufacture and glass; and (3) process equipment:. For the e-paper value chain, we can see that the entry of EU suppliers is perhaps possible across more value chain segments than for OLEDs. Apart from the ones mentioned for OLEDs, there are opportunities to enter into complete devices and content provision. In terms of vertical segments, the point of entry in OLED FPDs for Europe is most likely to be in the mass production of smaller FPDs for mobile handsets. In conclusion, OLEDs and e-paper have the potential to disrupt current displays market and in so doing they may enable EU companies to enter at selected points in the value chain to compete with the Asian ICT industry.JRC.J.4-Information Societ

Self-Powered Gesture Recognition with Ambient Light

We present a self-powered module for gesture recognition that utilizes small, low-cost photodiodes for both energy harvesting and gesture sensing. Operating in the photovoltaic mode, photodiodes harvest energy from ambient light. In the meantime, the instantaneously harvested power from individual photodiodes is monitored and exploited as a clue for sensing finger gestures in proximity. Harvested power from all photodiodes are aggregated to drive the whole gesture-recognition module including a micro-controller running the recognition algorithm. We design robust, lightweight algorithm to recognize finger gestures in the presence of ambient light fluctuations. We fabricate two prototypes to facilitate user’s interaction with smart glasses and smart watches. Results show 99.7%/98.3% overall precision/recall in recognizing five gestures on glasses and 99.2%/97.5% precision/recall in recognizing seven gestures on the watch. The system consumes 34.6 µW/74.3 µW for the glasses/watch and thus can be powered by the energy harvested from ambient light. We also test system’s robustness under various light intensities, light directions, and ambient light fluctuations. The system maintains high recognition accuracy (\u3e 96%) in all tested settings