Sensing the Forest
OSU electrical engineers would like to make it easier to collect information in harsh environments like the H. J. Andrews Experimental Forest. For good measure, they want to minimize maintenance and energy needs.
So with National Science Foundation support, Terri Fiez, the director of OSU’s School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS), has teamed up with Professor Karti Mayaram and four EECS Ph.D. students to create a prototype low-power sensor. Student members include Triet Le and James Ayers of Oregon, Thomas Brown of Florida and Napong Panitantum of Thailand.
The device contains an antenna and an integrated circuit that “harvests” RF — or radio-frequency — energy from a central hub. The power is used to record and transmit temperature data. Low-frequency RF energy, long used for radio and television, is the basis for wireless network systems, identification tags and other devices.
To date, laboratory and outdoor tests have achieved RF sensitivities three to four times higher than those reported in the literature, says Fiez.
This summer, the prototype 1-square-millimeter-sized chip will be deployed for a trial run at the Andrews Forest.
Future applications could extend to other environmental monitoring purposes, health care and wireless communication systems.