Development of self-powered wireless sensor nodes for internet of things applications and beyond

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The goal of this project is to develop self-powered wireless sensors platforms capable of sensing a variety of physical parameters and transmitting these sensed data wirelessly without requiring an internal energy source. Use of energy stored in batteries or supplied by the electricity grid through wired connections for powering wireless sensor nodes are either impossible or prohibitively costly in many emerging applications such as Internet of Things where recharging and replacing batteries for large number of portable nodes is extremely challenging, harsh environment sensors where the required batteries that withstand such conditions are not available and wired connections are extremely expensive, and biomedical implants where replacement of batteries often requires surgeries. Energy required for the operation of these self-sufficient wireless nodes can be harvested from any of these or a multitude of these ambient sources: radio frequency (RF), kinetic or vibration, thermal, and solar. RF energy harvesting, the process of scavenging energy from ambient electromagnetic waves, is among the most viable options because of the availability of RF energy with predictable strengths in presence of wireless networks. Availability of such self-sufficient wireless sensors will enable scaling IoT sensor platforms to the levels that were not previously possible resulting in significant saving and process enhancement in many industrial and consumer applications. While previously our team has made great progress toward implementing building blocks of the proposed system including RF energy harvesters with record-breaking efficiencies and ultra-low-power wireless transceivers with built-in sensing capabilities, in this project we plan to integrate and implementn all these building blocks on a single chip to produce a low-cost self-powered wireless IoT sensor platform for widespread adoption in industrial and consumer applications. This proof-of-concept prototype will enable us to attract private/government investment to start up a company to bring this ground-breaking technology to the IoT market.