THz Time-Domain Spectroscopy of Human Skin Tissue for In-Body Nanonetworks

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Terahertz Channel Characterization Inside the Human Skin for Nano-Scale Body-Centric Networks

This paper focuses on the development of a novel radio channel model inside the human skin at the terahertz range, which will enable the interaction among potential nano-machines operating in the inter cellular areas of the human skin. Thorough studies are performed on the attenuation of electromagnetic waves inside the human skin, while taking into account the frequency of operation, distance between the nano-machines and number of sweat ducts. A novel channel model is presented for communication of nano-machines inside the human skin and its validation is performed by varying the aforementioned parameters with a reasonable accuracy. The statistics of error prediction between simulated and modeled data are: mean (μ)= 0.6 dB and standard deviation (σ)= 0.4 dB, which indicates the high accuracy of the prediction model as compared with measurement data from simulation. In addition, the results of proposed channel model are compared with terhaertz time-domain spectroscopy based measurement of skin sample and the statistics of error prediction in this case are: μ = 2.10 dB and σ = 6.23 dB, which also validates the accuracy of proposed model. Results in this paper highlight the issues and related challenges while characterizing the communication in such a medium, thus paving the way towards novel research activities devoted to the design and the optimization of advanced applications in the healthcare domain

Nano-Communication for Biomedical Applications: A Review on the State-of-the-Art From Physical Layers to Novel Networking Concepts

We review EM modeling of the human body, which is essential for in vivo wireless communication channel characterization; discuss EM wave propagation through human tissues; present the choice of operational frequencies based on current standards and examine their effects on communication system performance; discuss the challenges of in vivo antenna design, as the antenna is generally considered to be an integral part of the in vivo channel; review the propagation models for the in vivo wireless communication channel and discuss the main differences relative to the ex vivo channel; and address several open research problems and future research directions

Collagen Analysis at Terahertz Band Using Double-Debye Parameter Extraction and Particle Swarm Optimisation

The paper focuses on the analysis of cultivated collagen samples at the terahertz (THz) band using double debye model parameter extraction. Based on measured electrical and optical parameters, we propose a model to describe such parameters extracted with a global optimisation method; namely, Particle Swarm Optimisation (PSO). Comparing the measured data with ones in the open literature, it is evident that using only cultivated collagen is not sufficient to represent the performance of the epidermis layer of the skin tissue at the THz band of interest. The results show that the differences between the measured data and published ones are as high as 14 and 6 for the real and imaginary values of the dielectric constant, respectively. Our proposed double debye model agrees well with the measured data

Cooperative In-Vivo Nano-Network Communication at Terahertz Frequencies

Nano devices have great potential to play a vital role in future medical diagnostics and treatment technologies because of its non-invasive nature and ability to reach delicate body sites easily as compared to conventional devices. In this paper, a novel concept of cooperative communication for in-vivo nano network is presented to enhance the communication among these devices. The effect on the system outage probability performance is conducted for various parameters including relay placement, number of relays, transmit power, bandwidth and carrier frequency. Results show approximately a 10-fold increase in the system outage performance whenever an additional relay is included in the cooperative network, hence shows a great potential of using cooperative communication to enhance the performance of nano-network at terahertz frequencies

On the bits per joule optimization in cellular cognitive radio networks

© 2014 IEEE. Cognitive radio has emerged as a promising paradigm to improve the spectrum usage efficiency and to cope with the spectrum scarcity problem through dynamically detecting and re-allocating white spaces in licensed radio band to unlicensed users. However, cognitive radio may cause extra energy consumption because it relies on new and extra technologies and algorithms. The main objective of this work is to enhance the energy efficiency of proposed cellular cognitive radio network (CRN), which is defined as bits/Joule/Hz. In this paper, a typical frame structure of a secondary user (SU) is considered, which consists of sensing and data transmission slots. We analyze and derive the expression for energy efficiency for the proposed CRN as a function of sensing and data transmission duration. The optimal frame structure for maximum bits per joule is investigated under practical network traffic environments. he impact of optimal sensing time and frame length on the achievable energy efficiency, throughput and interference are investigated and verified by simulation results compared with relevant state of art. Our analytical results are in perfect agreement with the empirical results and provide useful insights on how to select sensing length and frame length subject to network environment and required network performance

Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks

In this chapter, we present a literature survey of an emerging, cutting-edge, and multi-disciplinary field of research at the intersection of Robotics and Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) which we refer to as Robotic Wireless Sensor Networks (RWSN). We define a RWSN as an autonomous networked multi-robot system that aims to achieve certain sensing goals while meeting and maintaining certain communication performance requirements, through cooperative control, learning and adaptation. While both of the component areas, i.e., Robotics and WSN, are very well-known and well-explored, there exist a whole set of new opportunities and research directions at the intersection of these two fields which are relatively or even completely unexplored. One such example would be the use of a set of robotic routers to set up a temporary communication path between a sender and a receiver that uses the controlled mobility to the advantage of packet routing. We find that there exist only a limited number of articles to be directly categorized as RWSN related works whereas there exist a range of articles in the robotics and the WSN literature that are also relevant to this new field of research. To connect the dots, we first identify the core problems and research trends related to RWSN such as connectivity, localization, routing, and robust flow of information. Next, we classify the existing research on RWSN as well as the relevant state-of-the-arts from robotics and WSN community according to the problems and trends identified in the first step. Lastly, we analyze what is missing in the existing literature, and identify topics that require more research attention in the future

On the capacity bounds of K-tier heterogeneous small-cell networks employing aggressive frequency reuse

With the cell coverage area of current and future mobile networks becoming smaller, heterogeneous small-cell networks (HetSNets), where multiple low-power, low-cost base stations (BSs) complement the existing macrocell infrastructure, are considered constitutive elements of future mobile networks. In this paper, we propose a K-tier HetSNet, where multiple tiers of small-cells are padded between macrocells which in turn expand the network coverage and significantly increase in capacity without compromising the frequency reuse factor. In this context, we derive analytical capacity bounds of the K-tier HetSNets based on the distance of the desired user from its serving BS and all other interfering BSs. It was observed that the upper bound of the capacity becomes tighter as the number of small-cell tiers increases due to the increase in the number of small-cells. Simulation results show the performance of the proposed K-tier HetSNets against the macro-only network in terms of frequency reuse factor, capacity and area spectral efficiency

On the Traffic Offloading in Wi-Fi Supported Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

Heterogeneous small cell networks (HetSNet) comprise several low power, low cost (SBSa), (D2D) enabled links wireless-fidelity (Wi-Fi) access points (APs) to support the existing macrocell infrastructure, decrease over the air signaling and energy consumption, and increase network capacity, data rate and coverage. This paper presents an active user dependent path loss (PL) based traffic offloading (TO) strategy for HetSNets and a comparative study on two techniques to offload the traffic from macrocell to (SBSs) for indoor environments: PL and signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) based strategies. To quantify the improvements, the PL based strategy against the SIR based strategy is compared while considering various macrocell and (SBS) coverage areas and traffic–types. On the other hand, offloading in a dense urban setting may result in overcrowding the (SBSs). Therefore, hybrid traffic–type driven offloading technologies such as (WiFi) and (D2D) were proposed to en route the delay tolerant applications through (WiFi) (APs) and (D2D) links. It is necessary to illustrate the impact of daily user traffic profile, (SBSs) access schemes and traffic–type while deciding how much of the traffic should be offloaded to (SBSs). In this context, (AUPF) is introduced to account for the population of active small cells which depends on the variable traffic load due to the active users

Expanding Cellular Coverage via Cell-Edge Deployment in Heterogeneous Networks: Spectral Efficiency and Backhaul Power Consumption Perspectives

Heterogeneous small-cell networks (HetNets) are considered to be a standard part of future mobile networks where operator/consumer deployed small-cells, such as femto-cells, relays, and distributed antennas (DAs), complement the existing macrocell infrastructure. This article proposes the need-oriented deployment of small-cells and device-to-device (D2D) communication around the edge of the macrocell such that the small-cell base stations (SBSs) and D2D communication serve the cell-edge mobile users, thereby expanding the network coverage and capacity. In this context, we present competitive network configurations, namely, femto-on-edge, DA-one-dge, relay-on-edge, and D2D-communication on- edge, where femto base stations, DA elements, relay base stations, and D2D communication, respectively, are deployed around the edge of the macrocell. The proposed deployments ensure performance gains in the network in terms of spectral efficiency and power consumption by facilitating the cell-edge mobile users with small-cells and D2D communication. In order to calibrate the impact of power consumption on system performance and network topology, this article discusses the detailed breakdown of the end-to-end power consumption, which includes backhaul, access, and aggregation network power consumptions. Several comparative simulation results quantify the improvements in spectral efficiency and power consumption of the D2D-communication-on-edge configuration to establish a greener network over the other competitive configurations