CCSS: Communicating with Implanted Energy Harvesting Devices under Temperature Constraints

能量收集是一种范式转变，有几个重要原因：减少传统能源的使用，从而有益于环境;实现能源自给自足，能源自我维持，永久运行;通过切断充电线为无线设备提供真正的移动性。我们在这个项目中特别强调的能量收集的另一个重要方面是，它可以实现传统电池供电操作不可能或极不切实际的技术应用。这种应用的最突出的例子是体内和身体上的医疗和健康应用，其中设备被植入人体或紧密地安装在人体上。许多这样的生命关键应用在没有能量收集设备的情况下根本不可能或非常难以部署。该项目侧重于此类设备的通信和计算方面。当设备被植入或放置在人体上时，一种新的物理现象变得至关重要：由于数据的传输和处理，温度升高和周围组织的加热。该项目解决了这一重要问题，并开发了通信和计算方案，优化了设备的操作，同时保持温度在安全范围内。在这项研究中，我们结合联合收割机的生物热模型，与温度，通信理论模型，与吞吐量的功率，能量收集的限制，与能量收集的功率，构建一个优化框架，以确定最佳的操作原则，这样的系统。该框架的目标是确定最佳功率控制机制、最佳能量收集和能量传输方案以及最佳数据处理方法（采样、分布式压缩、编码、解码），使得整个系统针对其数据处理和数据传输目标最有效地操作，同时确保温度保持在预先指定的安全极限内。在这个项目中，我们考虑了四个主要的研究方向：1）了解热量的空间分布和开发方法，以保证特定位置和组织的温度保证。2)确定多个同时活动的设备的最佳操作原则;开发联合功率控制机制;设计合作方案;开发分布式信源编码方法。3)开发最佳处理机制，以确定电路的最佳开关时间;最佳压缩，编码和解码功率分配;以及最佳能量收集量。4)在温度限制条件下，确定这些设备远程无线充电的最佳能量传输速率，以及最佳能量和信息传输方案。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Energy harvesting is a paradigm shift for several important reasons: reducing the use of conventional energy and thus benefiting the environment; enabling energy self-sufficient, energy self-sustaining, perpetual operation; and furnishing wireless devices with true mobility by cutting the cord for recharging. Another important aspect of energy harvesting that we particularly highlight in this project is that it enables technological applications which are otherwise impossible or extremely impractical with a conventional battery-powered operation. The most prominent examples of such applications are in-body and on-body medical and wellness applications, where devices are either implanted in the human body or mounted closely on the human body. Many of such life-critical applications are simply impossible or extremely difficult to deploy without energy harvesting devices. This project focuses on communication and computation aspects of such devices. When devices are implanted in or placed on the human body, a new physical phenomenon becomes critical: temperature increases and heating of the surrounding tissues due to transmission and processing of data. This project addresses this important issue, and develops communication and computation schemes that optimize the operation of the device while keeping the temperature within safe limits. In this research, we combine bio-heat models that relate power with temperature, communication-theoretic models that relate power with throughput, and energy harvesting constraints that relate power used with energy harvested, to construct an optimization framework to determine the optimum operating principles for such systems. The goal of this framework is to determine optimum power control mechanisms, optimum energy harvesting and energy transfer schemes, and optimum data processing methods (sampling, distributed compression, coding, decoding) such that the overall system operates most efficiently for its data processing and data transmission goals, while ensuring that the temperature remains within pre-specified safe limits. In this project, we consider four major research directions: 1) Understanding spatial distribution of heat and developing methods to guarantee location- and tissue-specific temperature guarantees. 2) Determining optimum operating principles for multiple simultaneously active devices; developing joint power control mechanisms; designing cooperation schemes; developing distributed source coding methods. 3) Developing optimum processing mechanisms to determine the optimum on and off times for circuits; optimum compression, encoding and decoding power allocations; and optimum energy harvesting amounts. 4) Determining optimum energy transfer rates for remote wireless charging of these devices, and optimum energy and information transfer schemes, under temperature constraints.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.