Towards autonomous wireless sensors: RFID and energy harvesting solutions

Abstract

In this chapter, an extend vision on the sensing techniques and powering on smart and autonomous RFID tags is presented. In a society leaded by the information and networking, a link is defined between our real world and a virtual scenery for all the everyday objects. The linker is a smart wireless sensor. No better definition can be done by exploiting the real meaning of the words: This is the “Internet of the things era”. The most suitable technology for the development of smart sensors is the passive RFID technology because its battery-less operation, network interoperability and wireless capability. Several challenges are faced on the design of these smart and autonomous RFID sensors: sensing techniques, structure considerations and wireless powering are the main challenges discussed in this chapter. The power autonomy is presented under harvesting techniques with special interest on the electromagnetic energy harvesting. Design criteria of electromagnetic energy harvesters are also discussed. Some examples of applications on the most common sensed parameters including physical, biomedical, automatic product tamper detection and noninvasive monitoring are described.