Remote Control System for Battery-Assisted Devices with 16 nW Standby Consumption

• Main Authors: Manuel Ferdik, Georg Saxl, Erwin Jesacher, Thomas Ussmueller
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2019-02-01
• Series: Sensors
• Subjects: energy harvesting; internet of things; low-power electronics; radio frequency; switching circuits; wireless communication
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/19/4/975

One of the biggest impacts of the vision &#8216;Internet of Things&#8217; is the massive number of connected devices, where billions of nodes will exchange data, information and commands. While wireless systems offer advantages such as increased flexibility, they also introduce one major challenge: how to power each individual node. In many cases, there is no way around the use of batteries. To minimize the environmental impact, increasing the battery&#8217;s longevity is the most important factor. This paper introduces a wireless battery-assisted node that has a drastically reduced energy consumption in the standby mode. The state (on/off) will be changed by harvesting a radiofrequency signal. A latching switch connects or disconnects the load&#8212;for example, a microcontroller&#8212;and the battery. The switch is connected to a charge pump which converts an AC (alternating current) signal into a usable DC (direct current) control signal. An antenna is mounted to the charge pump via a matching network. An electromagnetic wave is emitted by a remote control switch that switches the system on and off. The used frequency is <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>868</mn> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> MHz and therefore in the UHF RFID (ultra high frequency radio frequency identification) band. The measurement results show that the wireless node consumes less than <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>16</mn> <mspace width="0.277778em"></mspace> <mi>nW</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula> in the standby mode. The remote controlling is possible from a distance of more than <inline-formula> <math display="inline"> <semantics> <mrow> <mn>12</mn> <mspace width="0.277778em"></mspace> <mi mathvariant="normal">m</mi> </mrow> </semantics> </math> </inline-formula>. The presented system can be integrated in further work on a UHF RFID tag. Thus, the existing protocol standard can be used to identify the object to be switched. By custom commands, the switching request can be transmitted from the remote control (UHF RFID reader) to the switching node.