Radio Frequency Energy Harvesting Sensor Node Prototype Design

Sensor devices to monitor the everyday world are becoming evermore important for the modern world. However, it is often infeasible to battery power and constantly maintain the enormous number of sensor devices that the future of wireless networks will demand. As such, a promising new mode for powering these devices is through energy harvesting; specifically, radio frequency (RF) energy harvesting poses a number of advantages when compared to other modes of powering low-power low-duty cycled devices. This thesis work proposes a sensor node device design based on RF energy harvesting as prototype implementation to show the feasibility of such a system. This work shows how sensor devices may be implemented with just energy from the ambient WiFi RF energy available in an office environment. By taking a systems approach, the RF energy harvesting sensor device is broken down into subsystem with each subsystem solving a unique problem. A working design of the different sections of the prototype including the antenna, rectifier, voltage boosting and conditioning, load system with a controller, sensor module and wireless transceiver is discussed. Finally, each of the individual subsystem is integrated together into a singular RFEH sensor module with the capacity to operate without supervision and battery while maintaining a relatively small form factor.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science (MSc)

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Engineering – Electrical & Computer

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Schulich School of Engineering

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• Melethil, Akash

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Fapojuwo, Abraham O.

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Vyas, Rushi J.
• Nowicki, Edwin Peter

• Energy Harvesting
• Radio Frequency
• Stochastic Geometry

Statement dc:rights

• University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.

Language dc:language.iso

eng

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/36437

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:ucalgary.scholaris.ca:1880/110254