Emmeric Tanghe

Characterization of On-Body Communication Channel and Energy Efficient Topology Design for Wireless Body Area Networks

Wireless body area networks (WBANs) offer many promising new applications in the area of remote health monitoring. An important element in the development of a WBAN is the characterization of the physical layer of the network, including an estimation of the delay spread and the path loss between two nodes on the body. This paper discusses the propagation channel between two half-wavelength dipoles at 2.45 GHz, placed near a human body and presents an application for cross-layer design in order to optimize the energy consumption of different topologies. Propagation measurements are performed on real humans in a multipath environment, considering different parts of the body separately. In addition, path loss has been numerically investigated with an anatomically correct model of the human body in free space using a 3-D electromagnetic solver. Path loss parameters and time-domain channel characteristics are extracted from the measurement and simulation data. A semi-empirical path loss model is presented for an antenna height above the body of 5 mm and antenna separations from 5 cm up to 40 cm. A time-domain analysis is performed and models are presented for the mean excess delay and the delay spread. As a cross-layer application, the proposed path loss models are used to evaluate the energy efficiency of single-hop and multihop network topologies.

The industrial indoor channel: large-scale and temporal fading at 900, 2400, and 5200 MHz

In this paper, large-scale fading and temporal fading characteristics of the industrial radio channel at 900, 2400, and 5200 MHz are determined. In contrast to measurements performed in houses and in office buildings, few attempts have been made until now to model propagation in industrial environments. In this paper, the industrial environment is categorized into different topographies. Industrial topographies are defined separately for large-scale and temporal fading, and their definition is based upon the specific physical characteristics of the local surroundings affecting both types of fading. Large-scale fading is well expressed by a one-slope path-loss model and excellent agreement with a lognormal distribution is obtained. Temporal fading is found to be Ricean and Ricean K-factors have been determined. Ricean K-factors are found to follow a lognormal distribution.

Coverage prediction and optimization algorithms for indoor environments

A heuristic algorithm is developed for the prediction of indoor coverage. Measurements on one floor of an office building are performed to investigate propagation characteristics and validations with very limited additional tuning are performed on another floor of the same building and in three other buildings. The prediction method relies on the free-space loss model for every environment, this way intending to reduce the dependency of the model on the environment upon which the model is based, as is the case with many other models. The applicability of the algorithm to a wireless testbed network with fixed WiFi 802.11b/g nodes is discussed based on a site survey. The prediction algorithm can easily be implemented in network planning algorithms, as will be illustrated with a network reduction and a network optimization algorithm. We aim to provide an physically intuitive, yet accurate prediction of the path loss for different building types.

Evaluation of Vehicle Penetration Loss at Wireless Communication Frequencies

Measurements and simulations of the vehicle penetration loss (VPL) at 600, 900, 1800, and 2400 MHz are presented. The measured average penetration loss varies from 3.2 to 23.8 dB, depending on frequency, illuminated vehicle side, and in-vehicle antenna orientation. VPL tends to follow a lognormal distribution. Reported penetration loss values are compared to previous measurements from the literature.

Comparison of power consumption of mobile WiMAX, HSPA and LTE access networks

Nowadays, wireless access networks are a large contributor to the CO2 emissions of ICT. Today, ICT is responsible for 4 % of the annual energy consumption and this number is expected to grow drastically in the coming years. The power consumption of these wireless access networks will thus become an important issue in the coming years. In this paper, the power consumption of wireless base stations for mobile WiMAX, HSPA and LTE is modelled and compared for a future scenario. For our research, we assume a suburban area and a physical bit rate of 10 Mbps. We compare the wireless technologies for a SISO and three MIMO systems. For each case, we give a ranking of the wireless technologies as a function of their power consumption, range and energy eff ciency. Based on these results, we cover a specif ed area with each technology and determine which technology is the best solution for the specif ed area. We also compare the power consumption of the wireless access networks with the power consumption of the wired access networks.

Power consumption in wireless access network

The power consumption of wireless access networks will become an important issue in the coming years. In this paper the power consumption of base stations for mobile WiMAX, fixed WiMAX and UMTS is modelled. This power consumption is evaluated in relation to the coverage. For a physical bit rate of 2 Mbps, a power consumption of approximately 5600 W and a range of 1 km is obtained with UMTS. Fixed WiMAX covers 70 % and mobile WiMAX only 40 % of this range. However, fixed and mobile WiMAX consume roughly 50 % less than UMTS. In a suburban area and for a physical bitrate of 2 Mbps, fixed WiMAX base stations consume approximately 6 W per user, mobile WiMAX base stations 17 W per user, and UMTS base stations 5 W per user. The power consumption of these wireless access networks is compared with other access network technologies and research challenges concerning these access networks are presented.

Personal distributed exposimeter for radio frequency exposure assessment in real environments

For the first time, a personal distributed exposimeter (PDE) for radio frequency (RF) measurements is presented. This PDE is designed based on numerical simulations and is experimentally evaluated using textile antennas and wearable electronics. A prototype of the PDE is calibrated in an anechoic chamber. Compared to conventional exposimeters, which only measure in one position on the body, an excellent isotropy of 0.5 dB (a factor of 1.1) and a 95% confidence interval of 7 dB (a factor of 5) on power densities are measured.

In-situ measurement procedures for temporal RF electromagnetic field exposure of the general public.

In this paper, the general publics exposure to FM, GSM, and UMTS over 7 days time is investigated. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how short-period measurements can be representative for the actual maximal and average exposure during longer periods such as 1 week. Locations of public RF exposure have been categorized according to the type of environment, population density, and the amount of mobile phone traffic. Five different sites have been selected to perform measurements of the electric fields over time. In total 352,800 time samples of the electric field were obtained from the measurement campaign. A factor X is defined as the ratio between the actual maximal value of the temporal measurements and the estimated maximal value from short-period data. Three different methods to assess X are compared and an optimal method is proposed for an in-situ measurement procedure. Median values of X according to the proposed method are 1.05, 0.47, and 0.96, for FM, GSM, and UMTS, respectively. Moreover a factor R is defined as the ratio between the median and maximal value of the momentary temporal field measurements, indicating the level of variation of a certain signal over time. R enables to calculate maximal values from median values and vice versa. Median values of R are 0.92, 0.66, and 0.71 for FM, GSM, and UMTS, respectively. By combining X and R one can estimate the actual maximal and median exposure during longer periods from short-period measurements.

Experimental Assessment of Specific Absorption Rate Using Room Electromagnetics

A closed room environment is viewed as a lossy cavity, characterized by possibly a line-of-sight component and diffuse scattering parts from walls and internal obstacles. A theory used in acoustics and reverberation chambers is applied for the electromagnetic case, and main issues related to measurement systems, antennas characteristics, diffuse energy properties, and human exposure are investigated. The goal of this paper aims first toward validation of the assessment of the reverberation time in an environment using a virtual multiple-input-multiple-output channel system. Second, the reverberation time in an adjacent room is investigated, and hence, a measurement-based method is readily developed to assess the absorption cross section and the whole-body specific absorption rate of humans at 2.3 GHz in a realistic closed environment.

Influence of Reception Condition, MPE-FEC Rate and Modulation Scheme on Performance of DVB-H

DVB-H networks allow high data rate broadcast access for hand-held terminals. A method to analyze the performance is developed. The influence of different MPE-FEC rates and modulation schemes on the performance of a DVB-H network is analyzed in this paper for 9 different reception conditions. Portable (indoor and outdoor) and mobile reception (car, train, tram, bus) are investigated. This analysis enables better estimations of the performance of DVB-H systems and an optimized DVB-H performance model. The percentage of valid reception, MPE-FEC gains, carrier to interference-plus-noise ratios, and minimal signal strengths for the different reception conditions and modulation schemes are presented.