SpecEES: Spectrally-Efficient Near-Zero-Power IoT Connectivity with Existing Wi-Fi Infrastructure

SpecEES：与现有 Wi-Fi 基础设施的频谱效率近零功耗物联网连接

• 批准号: 1923902
• 负责人: Dinesh Bharadia
• 金额: $ 75万
• 依托单位: University of California-San Diego
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-10-01 至 2023-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1923902&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SpecEES; Spectrally; Efficient; Near; Zero

In order to truly enable the vision of ubiquitous devices connected to the Internet (Internet-of Things or IoT), connections should be possible with a minimal overhead for deployment, device and operational costs. To limit the deployment overhead, wireless connectivity should occur via existing infrastructure. Unfortunately, the most popular wireless network in enterprises and healthcare facilities is Wi-Fi, and the power consumption of Wi-Fi chipsets is too large (100s of milliwatts) to be easily powered by small coin cell batteries without large operational costs to frequently replace or re-charge batteries. As a result, current deployments of IoT devices (like Google's Nest systems) are limited to locations where they can be plugged into a power source. This issue is currently holding back innovation in new IoT device concepts. Since reducing the power consumption of Wi-Fi transceivers using conventional techniques is not possible, a new communication approach is needed. The primary objective of this proposal is to enable new classes of battery-powered IoT devices that can directly communicate with Wi-Fi access points by just reflecting or backscattering existing Wi-Fi signals. Since backscattering requires only a passive antenna with a reflection circuit with computationally relaxed baseband specifications, low-power operation at the IoT device-level can be achieved. Successful research will enable more rapid adoption of IoT devices into existing infrastructure and will enable new classes of low-power environmental, industrial, smart home, and health monitoring applications. Beyond enabling exciting new applications, the project also proposes a synergistic educational and outreach plan that leverages technical work performed in the grant to build exciting new demos to be used in undergraduate and K-12 classroom settings. For example, a fruit-based energy harvesting system powering the developed low power tags which communicate directly with Wi-Fi devices will introduce students to the wonders of engineering in a pragmatic yet compelling way, with the hope of increasing diversity in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)-related education environments. The proposed work specifically aims to enable the first practical low-power, low-cost integrated circuit solution which can enable a network of backscatter tags to connect with existing and Wi-Fi protocols. It would be the first to include a low-power universal-WiFi wake-up receiver for efficient synchronization and medium access control for the backscatter tags, and then backscatter Wi-Fi compliant signals piggybacked with IoT data. Importantly, the proposed backscatter platform will operate seamlessly with all existing Wi-Fi infrastructure so as to not interfere with existing spectrally-efficient productive communication.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

为了真正实现无处不在的设备连接到互联网(物联网或IoT)的愿景，应该能够以最低的部署、设备和运营成本进行连接。要限制部署开销，应通过现有基础设施进行无线连接。不幸的是，企业和医疗机构中最受欢迎的无线网络是Wi-Fi，Wi-Fi芯片组的功耗太大(100毫瓦)，很难在没有较大运营成本的情况下通过小型硬币电池供电，因此无法频繁更换或充电电池。因此，目前物联网设备(如谷歌的Nest系统)的部署仅限于可以插入电源的地点。这个问题目前阻碍了新的物联网设备概念的创新。由于无法使用传统技术降低Wi-Fi收发器的功耗，因此需要一种新的通信方法。这项提议的主要目标是实现新型电池供电的物联网设备，这些设备只需反射或后向散射现有Wi-Fi信号，即可与Wi-Fi接入点直接通信。由于后向散射只需要一个带有反射电路的无源天线，其基带规格在计算上是宽松的，因此可以实现物联网设备级的低功耗操作。成功的研究将使物联网设备能够更快地应用到现有基础设施中，并将支持新的低功耗环境、工业、智能家居和健康监测应用。除了支持令人兴奋的新应用外，该项目还提出了一项协同教育和推广计划，利用赠款中开展的技术工作，建立令人兴奋的新演示，用于本科生和K-12课堂环境。例如，一个基于水果的能量采集系统为开发的低功率标签提供动力，这些标签直接与Wi-Fi设备通信，将以务实而引人注目的方式向学生介绍工程奇迹，希望增加与科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)相关的教育环境的多样性。这项拟议的工作专门旨在实现第一个实用的低功耗、低成本的集成电路解决方案，该解决方案可以使背向散射标签网络与现有的Wi-Fi协议连接。它将是第一个包括低功耗通用WiFi唤醒接收器的设备，用于高效同步后向散射标签和媒体访问控制，然后利用物联网数据携带符合后向散射Wi-Fi标准的信号。重要的是，拟议的反向散射平台将与所有现有的Wi-Fi基础设施无缝运行，从而不会干扰现有的频谱高效的高效通信。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

12.2 Improving the Range of WiFi Backscatter Via a Passive Retro-Reflective Single-Side-Band-Modulating MIMO Array and Non-Absorbing Termination

12.2 通过无源回归反射单边带调制 MIMO 阵列和非吸收终端提高 WiFi 反向散射范围

• DOI: 10.1109/isscc42613.2021.9366014
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: ISSCC
• 作者: Meng, Miao;Dunna, Manideep;Yu, Hans;Kuo, Shihkai;Wang, P-H. P.;Bharadia, Dinesh;Mercier, Patrick P.
• 通讯作者: Mercier, Patrick P.

A WiFi and Bluetooth Backscattering Combo Chip Featuring Beam Steering via a Fully-Reflective Phased-Controlled Multi-Antenna Termination Technique Enabling Operation Over 56 Meters

WiFi 和蓝牙反向散射组合芯片，通过全反射相控多天线终端技术实现波束控制，可在 56 米以上的范围内运行

• DOI: 10.1109/isscc42614.2022.9731744
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: ISSCC
• 作者: Kuo, Shih-Kai;Dunna, Manideep;Bharadia, Dinesh;Mercier, Patrick P.
• 通讯作者: Mercier, Patrick P.

A Low-Power Backscatter Modulation System Communicating Across Tens of Meters With Standards-Compliant Wi-Fi Transceivers

低功耗反向散射调制系统，可通过符合标准的 Wi-Fi 收发器在数十米范围内进行通信

• DOI: 10.1109/jssc.2020.3023956
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits
• 影响因子: 5.4
• 作者: Wang, Po-Han Peter;Zhang, Chi;Yang, Hongsen;Dunna, Manideep;Bharadia, Dinesh;Mercier, Patrick P.
• 通讯作者: Mercier, Patrick P.

SyncScatter: Enabling WiFi like synchronization and range for WiFi backscatter Communication

• 发表时间: 2021
• 作者: Manideep Dunna;Miao Meng;P. Wang;Chi Zhang;P. Mercier;Dinesh Bharadia

21.5 An LTE-Harvesting BLE-to-WiFi Backscattering Chip for Single-Device RFID-Like Interrogation

21.5 用于单设备类 RFID 询问的 LTE 采集 BLE 至 WiFi 反向散射芯片

• DOI: 10.1109/isscc42615.2023.10067815
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: 21.5 An LTE-Harvesting BLE-to-WiFi Backscattering Chip for Single-Device RFID-Like Interrogation
• 作者: Kuo, Shih-Kai;Dunna, Manideep;Lu, Hongyu;Agarwal, Akshit;Bharadia, Dinesh;Mercier, Patrick P.
• 通讯作者: Mercier, Patrick P.