IoT-Ready Millimeter-Wave Radar Sensors

Abstract

This paper demonstrates a millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) radar sensor chip set for industrial, scientific, medical (ISM) and internet of things (IoT) applications. Thanks to their modular expandable wireless transceiver architecture, these radar chips offer implementing multimode radar sensors capable of deploying multiple radar techniques to detect object presence, range, velocity, vibrations and direction of arrival across multiple applications in conjunction with data communication capability for machine-to-machine (M2M) interaction. A 60GHz single-channel radar sensor prototype is implemented where the frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radar technique is applied for object detection and range measurement in a multitarget scenario. A range resolution of 6cm and a ranging precision of 0.lmm at 1m range are experimentally verified. Another two-channel sensor prototype is implemented where multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radar technique is applied for direction-of-arrival (DoA) estimation. An experiment of measuring vibration rates from multiple targets at different locations using Doppler radar technique is successfully conducted. This experiment simulates a remote control environment of running machines in factories. Furthermore, an experiment of monitoring a human heartbeat rate remotely by the sensor is performed where a 78bpm rate is measured. Such contactless measurement is extremely important to prevent disease spreading during pandemic seasons such as COVID-19.