CNS Core: Medium: Networked Smart Paper: Towards Invisible Wearables for Humans and Things

该提案的目标是探索基本的通信和传感技术，将普通的物理世界转变为互联的智能物联网（IoT）生态系统。尽管经历了多代的发展，但数字设备仍然需要大量的用户参与电池充电和网络设置，而目前的技术还没有准备好让日常生活变得互联和智能。为了解决网络的挑战，该项目将工作技术超薄纸状通信标签，由一个毫米级的无线电芯片沿着与电力收集单元，可打印的柔性天线，和可打印的能量存储单元。这种标签被称为网络智能纸（NSP），可以编织到衣服上或贴在普通物体上，从而将人或物纳入物联网。由此产生的硬件和软件将完全开源，并成为社区资源，使无线系统，射频集成电路（RFIC）和印刷电子等相关行业受益。该项目将通过暑期研究实习计划和对代表性不足的群体的宣传，让学生参与实验性物联网研究。 拟议的NSP项目旨在通过解决低功耗RFIC、可印刷电子产品和无线网络方面的跨学科挑战，将物联网愿景扩展到当前一代移动的设备之外。它将在极低功耗、极薄/灵活的外形以及与传统网络基础设施兼容性的限制下，革新物联网无线电架构和网络协议设计。 特别是，NSP探索了一种新颖的“超薄无线电”架构，该架构采用类似开关键控的节能调制，但通过信号波形近似保持与WiFi物理层的兼容。此外，NSP还将通过免关联网络管理和特定于应用的寻址实现精简的网络堆栈。 NSP能够重用大量传统WiFi基础设施，有助于消除阻碍物联网部署的部署障碍。 此外，NSP还针对超薄无线电架构进行了芯片级优化，旨在实现比传统WiFi收发器芯片低三个数量级的功耗。与现有的无源无线电架构（例如，NSP支持信道化（从而实现共存和频率重用）;它可以通过从间歇性环境射频信号中收集和存储能量来为通信和计算（网络堆栈）操作提供动力。小型化的无线电芯片、可打印天线和能量存储单元共同实现了超薄外形，使NSP成为真正的可穿戴和可连接的物联网设备，适用于人类和物体。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this proposal is to explore fundamental communication and sensing technologies to transform the ordinary physical world into a connected, intelligent Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. Despite multiple generations of evolution, digital devices still demand substantial user involvement for battery charging and network setup, and current technologies are not yet ready to make everyday things connected and intelligent. To address the networking challenges, this project will work technology for ultra-thin paper-like communication tags, composed of a mm-scale radio chip along with power harvesting unit, printable flexible antennas, and printable energy storage unit. The tag, referred to as Networked Smart Paper (NSP), can potentially be woven into clothes or attached on plain objects, thus encompassing humans or things into the IoT. The resulting hardware and software will be made fully open-source and become a community resource, to benefit the relevant industries in wireless systems, radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFIC), and printed electronics. This project will engage students in experimental IoT research through the summer research internship program and outreach to under-represented groups. The proposed NSP project aims to extend the IoT vision beyond the current-generation mobile devices, by addressing cross-disciplinary challenges in low-power RFIC, printable electronics, and wireless networking. It will renovate the IoT radio architecture and network protocol design, under the constraints of extremely low-power, extremely thin/flexible form-factor, and compatibility with the legacy network infrastructure. In particular, NSP explores a novel "slim radio" architecture, which adopts on-off-keying-like energy-efficient modulation, but remains compatible with the WiFi physical layer through signal waveform approximation. In addition, NSP will realize a slim network stack through association-free network management and application-specific addressing. NSP's ability to reuse the massive legacy WiFi infrastructure helps eliminate the deployment barrier that has been hindering IoT deployment. In addition, NSP explores chip-level optimization for the slim radio architecture, aiming to achieve up to three orders of magnitude lower power consumption compared with legacy WiFi transceiver chips. Unlike existing passive radio architectures (e.g., Radio Frequency Identifier tags and backscatter), NSP supports channelization (thus enabling coexistence and frequency reuse); it can power both the communication and computation (network stack) operations, by scavenging and storing the energy from intermittent ambient radio frequency signals. The miniaturized radio chip, printable antenna and energy storage units together enable ultra-thin form factor, making NSP a truly wearable and attachable IoT device for humans and things.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.