Foldable all-textile cavity-backed slot antennas for personal UWB localization

An all-textile multimoded cavity-backed slot antenna has been designed and fabricated for body-worn impulse radio ultra-wideband (IR-UWB) operation in the 3,744-4,742.4 MHz frequency band, thereby covering Channels 2 and 3 of the IEEE 802.15.4a standard. Its light weight, mechanical flexibility, and small footprint of 35 mm x 56 mm facilitate integration into textile for radio communication equipment for first aid responders, personal locator beacons, and equipment for localization and medical monitoring of children or the elderly. The antenna features a stable radiation pattern and reflection coefficient in diverse operating conditions such as in free space, when subject to diverse bending radii and when deployed on the torso or upper right arm of a test person. The high isolation toward the wearer's body originates from the antenna's hemispherical radiation pattern with a -3 dB beamwidth of 120 degrees and a front-to-back ratio higher than 11 dB over the entire band. Moreover, the antenna exhibits a measured maximum gain higher than 6.3 dBi and a radiation efficiency over 75%. In addition, orientation-specific pulse distortion introduced by the antenna element is analyzed by means of the System Fidelity Factor (SFF). The SFF of the communication link between two instances of this antenna is higher than 94% for all directions within the antenna's -3 dB beamwidth. This easily wearable and deployable antenna is suitable to support IR-UWB localization with an accuracy in the order of 5 cm

Studies of Scattering, Reflectivity, and Transmitivity in WBAN Channel: Feasibility of Using UWB

The Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) is one of the fledging paradigms that the next generation of wireless systems is sprouting towards. Among them, a more specific category is the Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN) used for health monitoring. On the other hand, Ultra-Wideband (UWB) comes with a number of desirable features at the physical layer for wireless communications. One big challenge in adoption of UWB in WBAN is the fact that signals get attenuated exponentially. Due to the intrinsic structural complexity in human body, electromagnetic waves show a profound variation during propagation through it. The reflection and transmission coefficients of human body are highly dependent upon the dielectric constants as well as upon the frequency. The difference in structural materials such as fat, muscles and blood essentially makes electromagnetic wave attenuation to be different along the way. Thus, a complete characterization of body channel is a challenging task. The connection between attenuation and frequency of the signal makes the investigation of UWB in WBAN an interesting proposition. In this paper, we study analytically the impact of body channels on electromagnetic signal propagation with reference to UWB. In the process, scattering, reflectivity and transmitivity have been addressed with analysis of approximate layer-wise modeling, and with numerical depictions. Pulses with Gaussian profile have been employed in our analysis. It shows that, under reasonable practical approximations, the human body channel can be modeled in layers so as to have the effects of total reflections or total transmissions in certain frequency bands. This could help decide such design issues as antenna characteristics of implant devices for WBAN employing UWB

Planar monopole antennas with reflection plane for human body centric communication

Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN) is an emerging technology that requires an antenna to be placed on human body for a wide range of applications such as healthcare, entertainment, surveillance, emergency and military. The reflection coefficient magnitude of the antenna in closeness to the human body is degraded and shifted. Essentially, efficiency and gain reduction are the main disadvantages of the antenna performances due to the body effect. In this research, methods of improving efficiency, gain, Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) and stabilizing reflection coefficient magnitude have been proposed. In this work, the design, simulation and fabrication of two monopole antennas with P-shaped and circular-shaped are presented. The proposed P-shaped monopole antenna is designed to operate from 3.1 to 5.1 GHz while the proposed circular-shaped monopole antenna operates at 3.1-5.1 GHz and 6.5-8 GHz. The simulation of the proposed antennas in free space and close proximity of body surface has been carried out using Computer Simulation Technology (CST) Microwave Studio. It has been found that when the P-shaped and circular elements are introduced to the ground plane of the antennas, the reflection coefficient magnitudes with the presence of body for both antennas remain the same as in free space. Moreover, the efficiency and gain of the antennas have been improved by attaching the glass substrate to the ground plane. P-shaped antenna with the glass substrate has demonstrated about 34.6%, 35% and 39.2% improvement of the antenna efficiency at 3.3, 4.45 and 5 GHz, respectively, when placed directly on the human head. For the human chest placement, the antenna demonstrates 30.7%, 33.4% and 36%, and the gain of 3.4, 2.8 and 4 dBi of antenna efficiency and gain improvement at 3.3, 4.45 and 5 GHz, respectively. Similarly, for circular-shaped monopole antenna the improvement of the antenna efficiency obtained for human head are 39.8% and 37.23% at 3.3 and 7.5 GHz, respectively, and for the chest are 36.5% and 32.8% at 3.3 and 7.5 GHz, accordingly. The antenna demonstrates 2.9 and 2.54 dBi improvement of the gain at 3.3 and 7.5 GHz, respectively. These improvements are compared with the antenna without the glass substrate. This study concludes that the glass substrate has improved the gain, efficiency and SAR when placed near human body compared to other antennas and the S11 remains stable when some additional elements are introduced to the ground plane. It was observed that there is good agreement between the simulation and measurement results, thereby showing that the antennas have potential to be deployed for WBAN application

Detecting Vital Signs with Wearable Wireless Sensors

The emergence of wireless technologies and advancements in on-body sensor design can enable change in the conventional health-care system, replacing it with wearable health-care systems, centred on the individual. Wearable monitoring systems can provide continuous physiological data, as well as better information regarding the general health of individuals. Thus, such vital-sign monitoring systems will reduce health-care costs by disease prevention and enhance the quality of life with disease management. In this paper, recent progress in non-invasive monitoring technologies for chronic disease management is reviewed. In particular, devices and techniques for monitoring blood pressure, blood glucose levels, cardiac activity and respiratory activity are discussed; in addition, on-body propagation issues for multiple sensors are presented

Fault tolerance in WBAN applications

One of the most promising applications of IoT is Wireless Body Area Net-works (WBANs) in medical applications. They allow physiological signals monitoring of patients without the presence of nearby medical personnel. Furthermore, WBANs enable feedback action to be taken either periodically or event-based following the Networked Control Systems (NCSs) techniques. This thesis first presents the architecture of a fault tolerant WBAN. Sensors data are sent over two redundant paths to be processed, analyzed and monitored. The two main communication protocols utilized in this system are Low power Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) and Long Term Evolution (LTE). Riverbed Modeler is used to study the system’s behavior. Simulation results are collected with 95% confidence analysis on 33 runs on different initial seeds. It is proven that the system is fully operational. It is then shown that the system can withstand interference and system’s performance is quantified. Results indicate that the system succeeds in meeting all required control criteria in the presence of two different interference models. The second contribution of this thesis is the design of an FPGA-based smart band for health monitoring applications in WBANs. This FPGA-based smart band has a softcore processor and its allocated SRAM block as well as auxiliary modules. A novel scheme for full initial configuration and Dynamic Partial Reconfiguration through the WLAN network is integrated into this design. Fault tolerance techniques are used to mitigate transient faults such as Single Event Upsets (SEUs) and Multiple Event Upsets (MEUs). The system is studied in a normal environment as well as in a harsh environment. System availability is then obtained using Markov Models and a case study is presented

Dosimetric study of the radiolectric influence of humans into complex environments through determistic simulations and the implementation of a simplified model

The research presented in this thesis falls under the framework of dosimetry and deterministic estimations. A dosimetric study is carried out with the aid of a 3D Ray Launching simulation technique, by means of an in-house developed code at UPNA. Dosimetry is defined as the calculation of the absorbed dose when a tissue is exposed to electromagnetic radiation, in this case, non-ionizing radiation. It has reached a great importance since a part of the society starts to show concern about the exposure of people to artificial exposures caused by mobile phones or Wi-Fi networks. In fact, some entities (administrations and health bodies) are involved in the regulation and the release of guidelines about this subject. The objective of this thesis is to study dosimetry through 3D Ray Launching simulation technique, calibrating it by the implementation of several scenarios where the simulation tool is tested throughout the comparison of theoretical and measurement results. A simplified human body has been also developed with the aim of employing it in different scenarios, performing dosimetric estimations and providing insight on its influence in the electromagnetic power distribution inside an indoor scenario. Finally, obtained results are compared with different guideline thresholds giving an idea of the compliance of the law when usual wireless communication systems are emitting.Programa Oficial de Doctorado en Tecnologías de las Comunicaciones (RD 1393/2007)Komunikazioen Teknologietako Doktoretza Programa Ofiziala (ED 1393/2007

Ultra-Low Power Wake Up Receiver For Medical Implant Communications Service Transceiver

This thesis explores the specific requirements and challenges for the design of a dedicated wake-up receiver for medical implant communication services equipped with a novel “uncertain-IF†architecture combined with a high – Q filtering MEMS resonator and a free running CMOS ring oscillator as the RF LO. The receiver prototype, implements an IBM 0.18μm mixed-signal 7ML RF CMOS technology and achieves a sensitivity of -62 dBm at 404MHz while consuming \u3c100 μW from a 1 V supply