A Seminar Report on

Zero-Power Wireless Sensor for IoT Application

submitted in partial fulfillment for award of the degree of Bachelor of Technology in Electronics
and Communication Engineering

by

G Akhila 18321A0405

Under the esteemed Guidance of Internal Guide

A Navila

Assistant Professor, ECE Department

Bhoj Reddy Engineering College for Women

Department of Electronics and Communications Engineering
(Sponsored by Sangam Laxmibai Vidyapeet, approved by AICTE & affiliated o JNTUH)
Vinaynagar, Santoshnagar X roads, Saidabad, Hyderabad – 500 059
Ph: +91-40-2459 2400 Fax: +91-40-2453 7281, www.brecw.ac.in, principal@brecw.ac.in

2021- 2022
 Bhoj Reddy Engineering College for Women
(Sponsored by Sangam Laxmibai Vidyapeet, approved by AICTE & affiliated to JNTUH) Vinaynagar, I
S Sadan X Roads, Saidabad, Hyderabad 500 059, Telangana, India
Telephone: 040-2453 7282, Website: www.brecw.ac.in, Email: principal@brecw.ac.in

CERTIFICATE

This is certifying that the seminar report entitled “Crusoe Processor” is a bonafide work Carried out
by G Akhila bearing roll number 18321A0405 in partial fulfillment for award of the degree of
Bachelor of Technology in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Bhoj Reddy
Engineering College for Women, Hyderabad, affiliated to Jawaharlal Nehru Technological
University Hyderabad (JNTUH).

A Navila B. Jyothsna
Assistant Professor HOD - ECE

sangam Laxmibai Vidyapeet is an educational society for promotion of education

among girls and women. It is established in 1952 and registered under the
Telangana Societies Registration Act.
 Acknowledgement

The satisfaction that accompanies the successful completion of the task would be
incomplete without the mention of the people who made it possible, whose constant guidance and
encouragement crown all the efforts with success.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Ms A Navila Assistant Professor and Seminar
guide for the eminent guidance and supervision at every stage.
I am thankful to Ms B Jyothsna, Head of the Department for her valuable guidance,
encouragement during my Seminar.
I also thank Dr J Madhavan, Principal, BRECW for providing the wonderful education
environment in our college.
I am equally thankful to Mr S V M G Phani Kumar C , Assistant Professor, Seminar in
charge for his continuous support and all the staff of the Electronics and Communication
Department of BRECW for their friendliness help and suggestions in the Seminar.

G Akhila (18321A0405) ganamakhila@gmail.com

 Contents

Page No

i
List of figures

Abbreviations ii

Abstract iii

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

1.1 Overview 1

1.2 Aim 5

Chapter 2 Evolution 6

2.1 Evolution 6

2.2 Solution 7

2.3 Transdure 9

Chapter 3 working Principle

3.1 UHF RFID 16

3.2 Capactive Sensor 17

3.3 Backscattering 18

3.4 RFID Matching Network 18

3.5 Circulator
 3.6 Reader 22
Chapter 4 Advantages and Disadvantages
4.1 Advantages
4.2 Disadvantages
Chapter 5 Applications
Chapter 6 Conclusion
Chapter 7 Future scope
Chapter 8 References 8
Seminar Report Zero-Power wireless Sensor for IoT Applications

List of Figures

Page No
Figure1.1.a A typical wireless sensor network 2
Figure 1.1.b Potential applications of Zero-Power wireless sensor network 4
Figure 2.2 Zero Power wireless Sensor Diagram
Figure 3.1Block Diagram of Zero Power Wireless Sensor 14

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Seminar Report Zero-Power wireless Sensor for IoT Applications

List of Tables
Page No

Table 2.3 Energy Harvesting Transducer comparisons 11

Table 3.1 A comparison of various RFID tags 13

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Abbreviations

IoT - Internet of Things

UHF - Ultra High Frequency
RFID - Radio Frequency Identification
IC - Integrated circuit
RCS - Rader Cross-Section

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Abstract
With wireless sensors, wide range of applications for IoT is possible. Individuals and
organizations can use wireless sensors to enable many different kinds of smart
applications. From interconnected homes to smart cities, wireless sensors create the
infrastructure upon which the IoT comes alive. A zero-power wireless sensor, which is a
passive sensor, combines UHF RFID and a capacitive sensor to enable reading of
physical and chemical parameters wirelessly, without compromising much on the read-
range, and complexity of conventional RFID tags. The sensor alters the phase of
backscattered RFID signal, which is detected at the receiver using a non-coherent IQ
demodulator. Due to the universal nature of the architecture any type of sensor, such as
temperature, humidity, water level sensor, can be realized. The performance of zero-
power wireless sensor finds it’s uses in many real-world IoT applications.

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Chapter-1

Introduction

1.1 Overview
Wireless sensors are rapidly becoming an integral part of our daily lives. They
are widely being used to determine everyday useful information ranging from monitoring
temperature in a room to measuring fluid levels in different industries. Their widespread
usage has become possible due to their inexpensiveness and ease of installation. With the
advancements of the Internet of Things (IoT), the utilization of wireless sensors is
expected to grow exponentially to an extent that they will become ubiquitous. Owing to
this fast-paced growth, it has now become a need of the hour that some sophisticated
designs of wireless sensors be introduced that offer improvement in terms of
implementation, performance and cost. At a very fundamental level, a wireless sensor is
simply expected to identify a node and send a sensed parameter wirelessly to a base
station. Thus, there are three major components of its operation: communication,
identification and parameter sensing. To perform these operations, energy is required by a
sensor.

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Figure 1.1 A typical wireless sensor networks

Whatever technique is used to provide this energy directly influences the cost,
life-span, wireless operable range, and circuit complexity. Energy can be harvested from
almost any environment: Light, vibration, flow, pressure, motion, pressure, magnetic
fields, RF, etc. Energy harvesting applications include permanently powered wireless
sensors, Hybrid and active RFID, data logging and access control.
One method to provide energy to a sensor node is adding a battery to it, which
could be utilized to perform all the required operations. Although the wireless range of a
battery-assisted sensor is very long, usually in tens of meters, the battery is actually a
hurdle in a wireless sensor: it increases the cost of the system, it needs to be replaced
every few months and it makes the sensor bulky. Passive wireless sensors, on the other
hand, harvest energy, which is sent by a reading device, and perform all the required
operations. However, their range of operation is usually lower, up to a few meters.
Therefore, it is very important to engineer the hardware of battery less wireless sensors in
order to increase their working range.

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Zero-power radio frequency identification (RFID) tag based sensors, especially

the ones operating in the ultra-high frequency (UHF) band, are gaining a lot of interest.
Several designs have been proposed in the past. The simplest ones are chip less based
RFID sensors in which no integrated circuit (IC) is required and the sensor data is
determined by the change in the radar cross-section (RCS) of the RFID tag based on the
sensed parameter. These are very low-cost passive wireless sensors; however, due to their
analog communication nature, they are vulnerable to environmental effects and,
additionally, they do not allow multiple tags to be placed in a single area. Chip-based
tags, on the other hand, are considered a better candidate as they benefit from digital
modulation, thus allowing the deployment of techniques such as coding and anti-
collision, which enables reading of multiple tags simultaneously. In these sensors, usually
matching network of RFID is used as a sensor. Any changes in the parameter of interest
alters the operating frequency of the tag, thus causing alteration in the read-range at a
given frequency. This technique requires measuring the amplitude of the backscattered
signal at different frequencies to determine the sensed parameter and therefore it requires
a wider spectrum. A third type of battery-less sensors currently available in the market is
the one that incorporates a digitization circuitry that uses off-the-shelf available sensors
and digitally adds the sensed parameter’s information to the backscattered RFID signal.
However, this digital circuitry requires extra power, thus the read-range of the sensor
drops to a distance (typically 0.7–2.2 meter) where the power received is adequate to run
both the RFID and the digital circuitry. To the best of author’s knowledge, there is no
RFID based sensor design that integrates a sensor passively without affecting the read-
range of the RFID.
The proposed sensor architecture consists of a circulator, an antenna, an RFID
chip and a capacitv sensor. These components are connected in a sequence that the
interrogation signal, which is being sent by a reader, is fed to the RFID to harvest energy.
When the RFID responds back, the reflected signal is directed to the sensor before being
returned back by the antenna. This sequencing is accomplished by using a circulator. The
proposed sensor is capacitive in nature and thus it adds phase delay to the reflected
signal, based on the sensor value. The signal is reflected by the sensor and reaches back

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to the reader after being radiated back by the antenna. It should be noted here that, since
the sensor is physically separated in our architecture, unlike other previously discussed
works on RFID based sensors, the radiation characteristics of the antenna and the
performance of RFID such as read-range are not compromised by the changes in the
parameter being sensed.
At the reader, the phase delay due to the changes in physical or chemical
parameters experienced by the sensor, can be easily determined by using a non coherent
IQ demodulator. These demodulators are widely available in commercial RFID readers.
Therefore, by using this technique, cost of the sensors can be significantly reduced
without compromising much on the working range and complexity. This new design can
open door for several new applications ranging from personal use to industrial ones. An
illustration in Fig. 1.1 shows a humidity sensor and a temperature sensor being used in a
medical room to observe the environment, and a liquid level detector being used to
monitor the amount of dose given to the patient.

Fig 1.1 Potential applications of zero-power wireless Sensor network

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1.2 Aim
• propose an architecture for wireless sensors that provides longer range without
requiring a battery at the node;
• using the phase of the backscattered signal for determining the sensing parameter in a
passive manner;
• demonstrate its operation in a realworld scenario.

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Chapter-2

History
2.1 History
Like many advanced technologies, the origin of WSNs can be seen in
military and heavy industrial applications, far removed from the light industrial and
consumer WSN applications that are prevalent today. The first wireless network that bore
any real resemblance to a modern WSN is the Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS),
developed by the United States Military in the 1950s to detect and track Soviet
submarines. This network used submerged acoustic sensors – hydrophones – distributed
in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. This sensing technology is still in service today, albeit
serving more peaceful functions of monitoring undersea wildlife and volcanic activity.
Echoing the investments made in the 1960s and 1970s to develop the hardware for
today’s Internet, the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
(DARPA) started the Distributed SensorNetwork (DSN) program in 1980 to formally
explore the challenges in implementing distributed/wireless sensor networks. With the
birth of DSN and its progression into academia through partnering universities such as
Carnegie Mellon University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Lincoln Labs,
WSN technology soon found a home in academia and civilian scientific research.
Governments and universities eventually began using WSNs in applications
such as air quality monitoring, forest fire detection, natural disaster prevention, weather
stations and structural monitoring. Then as engineering students made their way into the
corporate world of technology giants of the day, such as IBM and Bell Labs, they began
promoting the use of WSNs in heavy industrial applications such as power distribution,
waste-water treatment and specialized factory automation.
While the market demand for WSNs was strong, moving beyond these
limited applications proved to be a challenge. The military, science/technology and heavy

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industrial applications of previous decades were all based on bulky, expensive sensors
and proprietary networking protocols. These WSNs placed a premium on functionality
and performance, while other factors such as hardware and deployment costs, networking
standards, power consumption and scalability fell to the wayside. The combination of
high cost and low volume prevented the widespread adoption and deployment of WSNs
into a broader range of applications.

2.2 Evolution
Sensors networks are gaining widespread use in factories, industrial
complexes, commercial and residential buildings, agricultural settings, and urban areas,
serving to improve manufacturing efficiency, safety, reliability, automation, and security.
These networks perform a variety of useful functions including factory automation,
measurement, and control; control of lighting, heating, and cooling in residential and
commercial buildings; structural health monitoring of bridges, commercial buildings,
aircraft, and machinery; tire pressure monitoring systems (TPMS); tank level monitoring;
and patient monitoring in hospitals and nursing homes.
To date almost all sensor networks use wired connections for data
communications and power. The cost of installing a sensor network using copper wire,
conduit, along with the support infrastructure has become extremely cost-prohibitive.
There are new emerging solutions using various wireless protocols such as ZigBee Green
Power, Bluetooth LE and 6LowPAN to network sensor devices and eliminate the data
communications wiring. However, the wireless sensors still need to be powered. Using
batteries such as AA cells has been used as a solution. But these batteries wear out and
changing them out is often an expensive proposition. On World Research has estimated
that this battery change-out cost will approach $1 Billion in 2013. What is needed is a
solution that harvests the ambient energy around the wireless sensor device and we can
cut the power cord forever.

2.2 Solution
Zero Power Wireless Sensors are the Solution. Wireless Sensor
Networks (WSNs) is the term that is used for wireless sensor and control networks that

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use batteries or Energy Harvesting techniques to power the device. With the availability
of low cost integrated circuits to perform the sensing, signal processing, communication,
and data collection functions, coupled with the versatility that wireless networks afford,
we can move away from fixed, hard-wired network installations in both new construction
as well as retrofits of existing installations.
One drawback to moving toward a wireless network installation has
been the poor reliability and limited useful life of batteries needed to supply the energy to
the sensor, radio, processor, and other electronic elements of the system. This limitation
has to some extent curtailed the proliferation of wireless networks. The legacy batteries
can be eliminated through the use of Energy Harvesting techniques such as usage of a
active RFID.
A Zero Power Wireless Sensor as shown in Figure 2.2 typically consists of five basic
elements:
1) A sensor to detect and quantify any number of environmental parameters such as
motion, proximity, temperature, pressure, pH, light, strain, vibration, and many others. 2)
An energy harvesting transducer that converts some form of ambient energy to
electricity.
3) An Energy Processor to collect, store and deliver electrical energy to the electronic or
electro-mechanical devices resident at the sensor node.
4) A microcontroller or variant thereof, to receive the signal from the sensor, convert it
into a useful form for analysis, and communicate with the radio link.
5) A radio link at the sensor node to transmit the information from the processor on a
continuous, periodic, or event-driven basis to a host receiver and data collection point.

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Figure 2.2 Zero Power Wireless Sensor Diagram

Traditional power sources for wireless sensors have typically been a primary (i.e., non-
rechargeable) battery such as AA or AAA alkaline cells, lithium thionyl chloride, lithium
coin cells, or a host of other chemistries. But there is another way of providing the power
source – harvesting the ambient energy surrounding the sensor device. Energy Harvesting
delivers the necessary power and energy to operate the sensor node and, further, does not

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require battery maintenance during the operational life of the sensor node. In effect,
Energy Harvesting enables perpetual sensors. Energy Harvesting transducers are a source
of power that is regularly or constantly available. This power source could come in the
form of a temperature differential, a vibrational source such as an AC motor, a radiating
or propagating electromagnetic wave, or a light source, as examples. Any of these power
sources can be converted to useful electrical energy using transducers designed to convert
one of those forms of power to electrical power.

2.3 Transducer
The following transducers are the most common as shown in Table 2.3:
• Photovoltaic: also known as solar - converts light to electrical power
• ElectroStatic or ElectroMagnetic – converts vibrations
• Thermoelectric: converts a temperature differential to electrical power
• Piezoelectric: converts a mechanical movement to electrical power
• RF and Inductive: converts magnetic power to electrical power

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Table 2.3 Energy Harvesting Transducer Comparisons

The efficiency and power output of each transducer varies according to transducer
design, construction, material, operating temperature, as well as the input power available
and the impedance matching at the transducer output.

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Chapter-3

Working Principle

3.1UHF RFID
UHF RFID setup generally consists of two components: an interrogator,
which reads information of an RFID tag; a tag, which keeps the tag ID and responds
back to an interrogator.
The interrogator, sometimes also referred to as a reader, transmits an RF
signal for a small duration of time. This signal serves three purposes. The first is to
energize the tag by transmitting an unmodulated RF signal. This energy is used to
wake up the tag. Following that, an interrogation signal is sent to request the tag to
respond back. Finally, the tag responds by sending its ID. Along with the tag ID, some
other useful sensing information such as temperature, humidity, water level, moisture,
flood etc. can also be included. This inclusion allows making a simple RFID a
wireless sensor node.

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Table 3.1 A comparison of various RFID tags

To send the information, the system requires some modifications based on

the preference. The sensor information can either be sent back in digital or in Analog
domain. Digital transmission is generally more immune to noise however it also
requires more power. Analog communication, on the other hand, is more power
efficient. In a scenario where nodes are powerless, power efficiency of the system is
paramount. Therefore, Analog communication is selected in our case.

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fig 3.1 Block Diagram of Zero Power Wireless Sensor

To realize the system, the power being reflected by the tag is sent
through a capacitive sensor on its way back to the reader. The block diagram is shown in
Fig. 3.1. As a result, the sensor adds some extra phase delay, depending on the condition
of the sensor, which allows reading the sensor value at the reader, without compromising
any power. Thus, the addition of sensor to the system doesn’t theoretically reduce the
read-range of the RFID tag. Reading the phase at the reader is accomplished by a non-

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coherent IQ demodulator, which is in-built in almost every commercially available

reader. The reader mixes an in-phase and a quadrature version of the transmitted signal
with the received one and determines the amplitude of the output. These amplitudes are
eventually used in determining the phase of the received signal.

The RF energy harvesting is a “Green” self-sustainable operation which can

potentially provide unlimited energy supply that can be used to remotely power up low
power devices. In particular, it helps to eliminate the need for a battery, which not only
increases the cost, weight, and size of the device but the battery replacement is also costly
and time-consuming especially when a lot of devices are spread over wide or inaccessible
areas. Furthermore, it improves the reliability, portability, and user and environment
friendliness and reduces the size and cost of the device. In addition, the finite lifetime of
the electrical batteries is encouraging the researchers to explore further solutions in the
field of RF energy harvesting, as acknowledged by Nikola Tesla, who described the
freedom to transfer energy between two points without the need for a physical connection
to a power source as an “all-surpassing importance to man” .

3.2 Capacitive Sensor

Sensors could be designed to be either resistive, in which resistance
changes with the change in the physical parameter, or reactive, in which reactance
changes with the change in the physical parameter. The former ones are usually lossy
and not preferred when energy efficiency is a concern. In the latter ones, since only the
reactance of the sensor changes, they are more energy efficient. In capacitive sensors,
usually change in parameter of interest causes permitivity variation that results in a
change in the capacitance. Therefore, they are a good candidate for a battery-less
wireless sensor.
Capacitive sensors are widely available in the market. However, their
operating frequency range is low, usually in the order of tens of kilohertz. Therefore,

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for a sensor to operate in the proposed system, new sensors with simple configuration
were designed.
For thorough understanding of the system, first a varactor diode
circuit was utilized to mimic a capacitive sensor. These diodes have a wide tuning
range from 1 pF to 53 pF at 915 MHz. They provide important information regarding
the behavior of the system such as the amount of phase change per picofarad. The
circuit design consists of a simple biasing network and a DC-blocking capacitor.
Another sensor was designed to determine flooding in a given region.
In the flood sensor, a design with two closely-spaced electrodes is used to form a
capacitor. As the water level rises, the average permitivity of the capacitor changes,
which in turn changes the capacitance of the sensor.
Finally, this change is superimposed on the RFID signal by altering the
phase of the backscattered signal from the tag and can be easily read at the reader.

3.3 Backscatter
Backscattering is a promising communication scheme to overcome the
challenges of increased power consumption and move toward zero-power sensor
implementations. Backscatter/reflection communication has found widespread use in
RFID systems due to the low cost of the fabricated tags used to identify objects and
commodities as well as to authenticate people. The application of backscatter radio is
not limited to static identification codes; it can be used to convey dynamic sensor
information as well. A sensor modulates and transmits signals through reflection rather
than radiation, effectively minimizing the power required for communication. An
active RF source emits signals, and the sensor’s antennas reflect these signals with
altered phase- and/or amplitude-modulated information. A receiver captures the
reflections and decodes the information.
Devices that adopt backscatter communication mechanisms have
very-low-complexity front ends because the minimal operation for modulation with a
reflecting antenna is alternating the load present at the antenna terminals between two

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values. This can be achieved using a limited number of active devices (transistors,
switches, or diodes) that switch on and off, changing the antenna’s load-system
reflection coefficient. These minimal front ends feature very low power consumption,
from nanowatts to low milliwatts, and can be implemented by all-passive RFID tags,
semipassive battery-assisted backscatter sensors, or custom tags with backscatter
modulators and RF energy harvesters

3.4RFID Matching Network

In order to connect the IC to the system, a matching network is
required to transform the tag impedance to match to the impedance of the circulator. A
differential or non-differential matching network may be designed. A differential
matching network provides out of phase signals at the input of the IC and thus
develops higher voltage difference at the input pins but at the expense of complexity.
For simplicity, we can use a non-differential matching network in
which one port of the IC was grounded and other was attached to a matching network,
which was designed to match the tag’s input impedance. A single-stub matching
network with open circuited series stub can be used for the matching.

3.5Circulator
A circulator can be physically realized in different ways, such as
Ferrite core, directional coupler with a mismatched port, etc. For simplicity, we
can use a low-cost ferrite-core clockwise circulator, SKYFR-001400 from
Skyworks, that offers very low insertion-loss, less than 0.5 dB.
For a clockwise ferrite core circulator, each individual
component must be connected in a proper sequence to have optimum performance.
An antenna may be connected to the port 1 of the circulator. If so, the RFID tag
with its matching network must be connected to the following port, in the
clockwise direction, i.e. port 2. Finally, sensor is connected to the last remaining
port. The final integrated system. The reason for connecting sensor after the RFID

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is as follows. Normally, a capacitive sensor is considered lossless, however,

practically, it may have some losses. If the signal from the reader is sent to the
sensor before it is sent to the RFID tag, it will be attenuated. As a result, signal
reaching the RFID terminals will be smaller in amplitude. Thus, the RFID will
store less energy.
On the other hand, if the sensor is connected after the RFID, in
the circulator, the RFID wakes up with a stronger signal resulting in a higher read-
range. In this case, the only loss a power-up signal faces is the circulator’s
insertion loss, which is only 0.5 dB. Whereas losses in the backscattered signal
will include: sensor loss and circulator’s insertion loss from sensor to the antenna.
imperfect reflection from the tag; circulator’s insertion loss from tag to the sensor;
As the sensitivity level of a typical reader can be as low as −90 dBm,
backscattered signal being attenuated can be tolerated. Therefore, this observation
confirms that charging the RFID tag is a limiting factor and advices that the
capacitive sensor should be connected after the RFID to avoid any loss in the
signal being received by the tag for the power-up purposes.
On the other hand, if the sensor is connected after the RFID, in
the circulator, the RFID wakes up with a stronger signal resulting in a higher read-
range. In this case, the only loss a power-up signal faces is the circulator’s
insertion loss, which is only 0.5 dB. Whereas losses in the backscattered signal
will include: imperfect reflection from the tag; circulator’s insertion loss from tag
to the sensor; sensor loss and circulator’s insertion loss from sensor to the antenna.
As the sensitivity level of a typical reader can be as low as −90
dBm, backscattered signal being attenuated can be tolerated. Therefore, this
observation confirms that charging the RFID tag is a limiting factor and advices
that the capacitive sensor should be connected after the RFID to avoid any loss in
the signal being received by the tag for the power-up purposes.

3.5Reader

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The reader is AS3993 Fermi evaluation kit that included all the
components and was able to provide up to 22 dBm of output power (extendable to 30
dBm for longer range). It includes a combination of a directional coupler and a low
pass filter to separate the transmitted signal with the received one. The received signal
is fed to a non-coherent in-phase (I) and quadrature (Q), IQ, mixer and sampled by an
ADC to determine the strength of the IQ components of the signal independently. By
applying a simple trigonometry the phase of the received signal is determined.
Finally, the phase delay caused due to the setup and distance between
the RFID reader and the tag is nullified by calibrating the system using a known
capacitance value attached to the RFID. Following that, the extracted phase value is
transformed into the respective parameter, such as voltage in case of the varactor or
the water level, in case of the flood sensor, to determine the state of the physical
parameter of interest.

Chapter-4
Advantages
4.1 Advantages
 inexpensive and ease of installation.
 Avoids plenty of wiring.
 the radiation characteristics of the antenna and the performance of RFID such as read-
range are not compromised by the changes in the parameter being sensed. High
mobility without compromise
 the loss of signal power is minimal.
 Flexible if there is a causal situation when an additional workstation is required.
 It might provide accommodations for the new devices at any time.

4.2 Disadvantages
 The operating range of this sensor is minimal.

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 It can not be used for high speed communication as it is designed for low speed
applications.

Chapter-5
Applications

 Area monitoring
Area monitoring is a common application. In area monitoring, the wireless sensor
network is deployed over a region where some phenomenon is to be monitored. A
military example is the use of sensors to detect enemy intrusion; a civilian example is the
geo-fencing of gas or oil pipelines.
 Health care monitoring
The medical field is one important application area for this sensor. For hygienic
purposes, the unique ability of high-frequency waves and microwaves to transfer
power to sealed devices in a contactless/cable-less way is a major advantage.
 Habitat Monitoring

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These sensor networks can be used to monitor various species and habitats,
beginning with the Great Duck Island Deployment, including marmots, cane toads in
Australia and zebras in Kenya.
 Industrial monitoring
 Machine health monitoring
Wireless sensor networks have been developed for machinery condition-based
maintenance (CBM) as they offer significant cost savings and enable new
functionality.
Wireless sensors can be placed in locations difficult or impossible to reach
with a wired system, such as rotating machinery and untethered vehicles.
 Water/waste water monitoring
Monitoring the quality and level of water includes many activities such as
checking the quality of underground or surface water and ensuring a country’s
water infrastructure for the benefit of both human and animal. It may be used
to protect the wastage of water.
 Data logging
these sensors can also be used for the collection of data for monitoring of
environmental information. This can be as simple as monitoring the
temperature in a fridge or the level of water in overflow tanks in nuclear
power plants. The statistical information can then be used to show how
systems have been working. The advantage of using a sensor over
conventional loggers is the "live" data feed that is possible.

 Environmental/Earth sensing
There are many applications in monitoring environmental parameters examples of
which are given below. They share the extra challenges of harsh environments and
reduced power supply.
 Natural disaster prevention

Wireless sensor networks can be effective used in preventing adverse

consequences of natural disaster, like floods. Wireless nodes have been

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deployed successfully in rivers, where changes in water levels must be

monitored in real time.

 Water quality monitoring

Water quality monitoring involves analyzing water properties in dams, rivers,

lakes and oceans, as well as underground water reserves. The use of many
wireless distributed sensors enables the creation of a more accurate map of the
water status, and allows the permanent deployment of monitoring stations in
locations of difficult access, without the need of manual data retrieval.

 Landslide detection

A landslide detection system makes use of a wireless sensor network to detect

the slight movements of soil and changes in various parameters that may
occur before or during a landslide. Through the data gathered it may be
possible to know the impending occurrence of landslides long before it
actually happens.

 Forest fire detection

A network of Sensor Nodes can be installed in a forest to detect when a fire

has started. The nodes can be equipped with sensors to measure temperature,
humidity and gases which are produced by fire in the trees or vegetation. The
early detection is crucial for a successful action of the firefighters; thanks to
Wireless Sensor Networks, the fire brigade will be able to know when a fire is
started and how it is spreading.

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Chapter-6
Conclusion

8.1 Conclusion
Wireless sensor systems are becoming more prevalent due to the rising
installation costs of hard-wired sensor systems, availability of low cost sensor nodes, and
advances in sensor technology. Energy Harvesting-based autonomous wireless sensor
nodes are a cost-effective and convenient solution. The use of Energy Harvesting
removes one of the key factors limiting the proliferation of wireless nodes - the scarcity
of power sources having the characteristics necessary to deliver the energy and power to
the sensor node for years without battery replacement. Significant economic advantages
are realized when Zero Power Wireless Sensors are deployed vs. hard-wired solutions.
Additional savings are realized by removing the significant costs of battery replacement
A Zero-Power Wireless sensor works without battery. The architecture of this
sensor integrates an RFID tag with a sensor and antenna using a circular. The sensors,

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which are designed to be capacitive in nature, add phase delay to the signal
transmitted by UHF RFID tag based on the parameters that is being sensed by the
sensor.
As this sensor provides longer range compared to other sensors available,
without the use of batteries it can be used in several different applications ranging
from healthcare, and industrial to smart home monitoring.

Chapter-7
Future Scope
Wireless sensors have the capacity to be installed everywhere, on the
road, underground, underwater, forests, battlefields, disaster prone area, work area,
etc. These sensor networks are one of the demanding needs in the today’s time due
to its ubiquitous nature. In the near future, WSNs can be deployed as underwater
acoustic sensor systems, cognitive sensing and spectrum management, and security
and privacy management .

With the advancement of Internet of Things(IoT), the utilization of

wireless sensors is expected to grow exponentially.
monitoring.

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As this sensor provides longer range compared to other sensors available,

without the use of batteries it can be used in several different applications ranging
from healthcare, and industrial to smart home.

Chapter 8

References
[1] B. S. Cook, R. Vyas, S. Kim, T. Thai, T. Le, A. Traille, H. Aubert, and M. M.
Tentzeris, ‘‘RFID-based sensors for zero-power autonomous wireless sensor
networks,’’ IEEE Sensors J., vol. 14, no. 8, pp. 2419–2431.
[2] R. Mirzavand, M. M. Honari, and P. Mousavi, ‘‘Direct-conversion sensor for wireless
sensing networks,’’ IEEE Trans. Ind. Electron., vol. 64, no. 12, pp. 9675–9682, Dec.
2017.

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[3] R. Mirzavand, M. M. Honari, and P. Mousavi, ‘‘High-resolution dielectric sensor

based on injection-locked oscillators,’’ IEEE Sensors J., vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 141–148,
Jan. 2018.
[4] R. Mirzavand, M. M. Honari, and P. Mousavi, ‘‘High-resolution balanced
microwave material sensor with extended dielectric range,’’ IEEE Trans. Ind.
Electron., vol. 64, no. 2, pp. 1552–1560, Feb. 2017.
[5] H. Saghlatoon, R. Mirzavand, M. M. Honari, and P. Mousavi, ‘‘Sensor
antenna for dielectric constant measurement of materials in contact with
the structure,’’ in Proc. 13th Eur. Conf. Antennas Propag. (EuCAP), 2019, pp.
1–3.
[6] AMS. Application Note: UHF RFID Fermi Reader HW-Description. Accessed:
Apr. 9, 2020. [Online]. Available: https://media.digikey.com/ pdf/Data
%20Sheets/Austriamicrosystems%20PDFs/AS3993-DK-
RBFERMI_Rev1.0_2012-06-26.pdf.

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