An Ambient RF Powered Wireless Sensor System

Abstract

The development of an ambient radio frequency (RF) powered Internet of Things (IoT) wireless sensor system is reported. The system integrates all major components including multiple antennas, rectifiers, a power management unit (PMU), a microcontroller unit (MCU) with RF transceiver module and sensing unit. A novelty of this applied engineering innovation is the design and use of multi-band dual-polarized multiple antennas to handle the low ambient RF power density found in the everyday environment. Our prototype demonstrates that it is possible to sense temperature, pressure and humidity and wirelessly transmit these signals to a central server with a duty cycle of approximately 15 minutes, when the background ambient RF signals are as low as -28.6 dBm at 950 MHz. The proposed system can address the important issue of energy supply in the development of IoT providing an alternative energy source to batteries or solar cells. Ambient RF powered IoT devices do not require periodic replacement of their batteries or to be placed in visible regions which makes them suitable for wall, ceiling and floor applications. Our ambient RF powered IoT wireless sensor system provides concrete proof, through demonstration, that harnessing ambient RF energy for powering IoT sensor systems is feasible.