SBIR Phase I: Passive Radio for the Internet of Things

该项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力是使Wi-Fi和其他无线电传输的功率比可能的低10000倍。该技术首次可以使用反向散射通信生成Wi-Fi和其他无线电传输，其功率比传统技术低几个数量级。这些反向散射传输可以在传统的Wi-Fi接入点、电话和其他设备上解码。考虑到人们对物联网的兴趣越来越大，其中小型计算设备嵌入日常物品和环境中，将通信的能源效率提高多达10，000倍将大大延长电池寿命。因此，该项目将使物联网在经济和环境上更加可行，因为电池将以较慢的速度运往垃圾填埋场。从经济上讲，减少或消除无处不在的传感器的电池将导致半导体行业的增长，以及其他业务的增长，由于有关物理世界的新数据来源，这些业务将能够让客户搜索物理世界。这一小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目提出了一个关键见解，即电池供电无线电中的高功耗、高频模拟和RF组件可以组合在一起，形成一个称为辅助节点的墙壁供电设备。能量受限的电池供电的移动的/嵌入式端点设备仅包含低频和大部分数字组件，使得其功耗可以忽略不计。移动的设备通过反射由助手产生的RF信号来传输数据。无线电系统的这种新颖的划分允许端点比使用主动无线电技术可能的通信更有效地进行通信。该项目旨在创建一个完整的网络堆栈，使无源设备能够与ISM频段中的传统有源设备共存。该系统由超低能耗端点传感器、墙壁供电辅助设备和商用现成有源无线电路由器组成。该项目涉及构建工作网络硬件，设计和实现与项目相匹配的网络堆栈？的独特需求，并与真实的客户测试所产生的系统。 如果成功，该项目将为普及连接设备的愿景提供关键的使能技术，数十亿设备连接到互联网，而无需更换电池。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this project is to enable Wi-Fi and other radio transmissions at up to 10000 times lower power than has been possible. The technique for the first time can generate Wi-Fi and other radio transmissions using backscatter communication, for orders of magnitude lower power than conventional techniques. These backscatter transmissions can be decoded on conventional Wi-Fi Access Points, phones, and other devices. Given the increasing interest in the Internet-of-Things where small computing devices are embedded in everyday objects and environments, improving the energy efficiency of communication by up to 10,000 times will substantially extend battery life. As a result, this project would make the Internet of things more viable economically and environmentally, since batteries will travel to landfills at a slower rate. Economically, reducing or eliminating batteries from pervasive sensors will lead to growth in the semiconductor industry, and also in other businesses, which will be able to allow their customers to search the physical world, thanks to the new sources of data about the physical world. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project introduces the key insight that the power-hungry, high-frequency analog and RF components found in battery-powered radios can be grouped together into a wall-powered device called the helper node. The energy constrained, battery-powered mobile/embedded endpoint device contains only low frequency and mostly digital components, making its power consumption negligible. The mobile devices transmit data by reflecting RF signals generated by the helper. This novel partitioning of the radio system allows the Endpoint to communicate far more efficiently than was possible with active radio techniques. This project aims to create a complete network stack that enables passive devices to coexist with conventional active devices in the ISM band. The system consists of ultra-low energy endpoint sensors, wall-powered helper devices, and commercial off the shelf active radio routers. The project involves building working networking hardware, designing and implementing a network stack matched to the project?s unique needs, and testing the resulting system with real customers. If successful, the project will have delivered the critical enabling technology for the vision of pervasively connected devices with billions of devices connected to the Internet without the need to replace batteries.