SBIR Phase II: Microelectromechanical System Radio Transceivers for Low-Power Wireless Networks

该小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第二阶段项目旨在开发一种基于微电子机械系统(MEMS)的无线电收发器，大幅降低电池供电设备中无线数据传输的运行功率。这类无线电的传统技术产品很多，但由于耗电量为10‘S兆瓦，它们无法依靠电池或回收的电力长时间运行。如果实现MEMS技术承诺的低功率无线电，可以大大延长无线耳机等消费类产品的电池续航时间，缩小电池尺寸，节省资金，增加最终用户的便利性。随着紧凑型可穿戴设备和消费设备的普及，电池空间正变得越来越宝贵，这强烈地刺激了低功耗电子产品。随着这项技术的成熟，不断扩大的设备互联(又名物联网)提供了更大的潜力。随着传感、控制和数据采集采用无线连接的市场迅速扩大，功耗正成为设备部署的主要限制因素。如果有更低功率的收发器，有线设备可能会被无线和电池更换周期减少甚至完全取消，从而节省时间和金钱，并为实现真正的万物互联铺平道路。这一SBIR二期项目的工作重点是使用适合批量生产和商业分销的制造工艺设计和验证基于MEMS的无线电的性能。通过将MEMS技术与传统电路设计相结合，建议的系统将使功耗降低10倍，低到足以使这些无线电设备仅靠电池供电就可以延长运行时间。在第一阶段项目中，使用与现有MEMS铸造工艺兼容的谐振器测试了基于MEMS的接收器的可行性，并验证了核心射频收发机组件的功耗为低300 mW。在第二阶段，将对这些结果进行扩展，以增加完整商业产品所需的额外收发器组件和软件堆栈。然后，最终的设计将被转移到大规模生产所需的商业铸造工艺中。该项目的最终目标是展示一个完整的基于MEMS的无线电，兼容广泛使用的蓝牙低能量协议，同时在接收模式下总共只有2兆瓦的功率。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project aims to develop a MicroElectroMechanical System (MEMS)-based radio transceiver providing a steep reduction in operating power for wireless data transmission in battery-powered devices. Conventional technology offerings for such radios are numerous, but with 10's of mW of power consumption they are unable to operate for long periods on batteries or scavenged power. If the low power radio promised by MEMS technology is realized, battery life of consumer products such as wireless headphones can be greatly extended, and battery size reduced, saving money and increasing convenience to the end user. With the spread of compact wearable and consumer devices, battery space is becoming increasingly at a premium, strongly incentivizing lower power electronics. As this technology matures, the expanding interconnection of devices (aka, the Internet of Things) offers yet greater potential. With rapidly expanding market adoption of wireless connectivity for sensing, control, and data collection, power consumption is becoming a major limiter in device deployment. If lower power transceivers are available, wired devices may be replaced by wireless and battery replacement cycles reduced or even done away with altogether, saving time and money, and paving the way to true interconnection of all things. The work of this Phase II SBIR project will focus on designing and verifying performance of the MEMS-based radios using fabrication processes suitable for mass production and commercial distribution. By combining MEMS technology with traditional circuit design, the proposed system will enable a 10x reduction in power consumption, low enough that these radios will allow extended operation on battery power alone. In the phase I project, the feasibility of the MEMS-based receiver was tested using resonators compatible with currently available MEMS foundry processes, and power consumption of the core radio-frequency transceiver components was verified at a low 300 mW. In phase II, these results will be expanded upon to add the additional transceiver components and software stack needed for a complete commercial product. The resultant design will be then transferred to the commercial foundry processes needed for mass production. The end goal of this project is to demonstrate a complete MEMS-based radio compatible with the widely-used Bluetooth Low-Energy protocol while operating on a total of only 2 mW in receive-mode.