Sze, Wai Kit. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 77-83). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgement --- p.vi / Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 2 --- Background and Related Work --- p.8 / Chapter 3 --- RFID Tag-set Cardinality estimation based on a Two-parameter implicit Channel Model --- p.13 / Chapter 3.1 --- System Model --- p.14 / Chapter 3.2 --- Number of Empty Slots Observed by the Reader --- p.16 / Chapter 3.3 --- Estimator Accuracy and Performance Analysis --- p.25 / Chapter 3.4 --- Results and Discussions --- p.32 / Chapter 3.5 --- Chapter Summary --- p.41 / Chapter 4 --- RFID Tag-set Cardinality estimation over Unknown Channel --- p.42 / Chapter 4.1 --- System Model --- p.43 / Chapter 4.2 --- Baseline: The Union-based approach --- p.45 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Motivation --- p.46 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Union Algorithm --- p.46 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- Analysis of the Union algorithm --- p.47 / Chapter 4.3 --- "Probabilistic Tag-counting over Lossy, Unknown channels via the Mh model" --- p.52 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- "Novel Interpretation of Mh for RFID Counting over Lossy, Unknown Channels" --- p.52 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- The Moment Estimator --- p.55 / Chapter 4.3.3 --- Sample Coverage Estimator --- p.57 / Chapter 4.3.4 --- Estimating the overall Tag population t --- p.59 / Chapter 4.4 --- Performance Validation and Comparison --- p.62 / Chapter 4.5 --- Chapter Summary --- p.65 / Chapter 5 --- Conclusions and Future Work --- p.73 / Chapter A --- Proof of Equation (3.6) in Chapter 3 --- p.75 / Bibliography --- p.77

<p>Technologies for position sensing and identification are important to have in ubiquitous computing environments. These technologies can be used to track users, devices, and artefacts in the physical milieu, for example, locating the position of a cellular phone in av physical environment. The aim of this thesis was to survey and classify available technologies for location sensing and identification. </p><p>We have made a literature study on both commercial and research-oriented systems and technologies for use in indoor and outdoor environments. We compared the characteristics of the underlying sensing technologies with respect to physical size, sensing method, cost, and accuracy. We conclude the thesis with a set of recommendations to developers and discuss the requirements on future sensing technologies and their use in mobile devices and environments.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 134-141).

Nearly one third of the 604,426 bridges in the United-States are either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. Monitoring these bridges is essential to avoid catastrophic accidents. In steel bridges fatigue induced crack/rupture, which is one of the most common modes of failure, can be avoided if the crack is detected at the early stages of its formation. Cracks usually originate at stress concentration areas but their precise origin is random. Such strain concentration can be monitored with traditional strain gages, but their installation requires lengthy wires and equipment, which are expensive and labor intensive. Therefore wireless sensors are being developed to cope with these problems. In this work, a passive wireless strain sensor based on RFID technology is described. The sensor is a patch antenna that resonates at a certain frequency, which shifts in presence of strain. The relation between the resonance frequency and the strain is approximately linear. The slope of the relation is called sensitivity. The behavior of the sensor's sensitivity is studied using experimental work and simulations that couple electromagnetism and mechanics. The sensitivity measured in experiments and in simulations in presence of uniform strain is different. This difference is lower for the sensitivity in presence of a crack, probably due to a parameter variation that is currently not accurately modeled in the simulations.

Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a technology used in many applications for the identification of objects. This thesis presents a concept of how libraries could use RFID technology to locate physical items within the library. The ability to locate items within the library changes the way users interact with physical material, creates new ways of user collaboration, and influences the ability to browse the shelves for physical items. Several implementation scenarios are presented in detail and implications on collaboration and browsing are analyzed.

Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a technology used in many applications for the identification of objects. This thesis presents a concept of how libraries could use RFID technology to locate physical items within the library. The ability to locate items within the library changes the way users interact with physical material, creates new ways of user collaboration, and influences the ability to browse the shelves for physical items. Several implementation scenarios are presented in detail and implications on collaboration and browsing are analyzed.

Simulation and experiments quantify the effect of moving a horizontal dipole antenna close to a metal ground plane. Solutions to the radiation problems are offered.

The concrete maturity method can be utilized to determine in situ strength of concrete. It uses the temperature of concrete to determine a maturity index that can then be used to determine strength of concrete. However, monitoring the concrete temperature using thermocouples brings up a wiring issue, which is not advisable in an equipment and human intensive area like a construction site. One of the ways to get around this wiring issue is to use Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology, which is capable of transmitting information wirelessly. Previous research implemented using ultra high frequency RFID tags embedded in fresh concrete found that water could be the impediment for transmitting RFID signal from within concrete during early stages of curing. From literature it was found that lower the frequency, better the chances of the wave penetrating water. The objective of the research was to figure out whether the frequency of RFID tags has any relationship with the readability of RFID tags embedded in fresh concrete. For this investigation, low frequency, high frequency, and ultra high frequency RFID tags were tested within fresh concrete to see any difference between tags in terms of transmitting information. This experiment was carried out in a controlled space to reduce the number of variables affecting the experiment outcome. The low frequency, high frequency, and ultra high frequency RFID tags were placed within 2 in x 3 in x 2 in wooden formwork at a depth of 4 in, 8 in, and 12 in. Ready mix concrete was poured into the formwork and 3 concrete cubes were cast with the tags embedded within them. Readers that could be connected to a laptop were used to monitor and collect the time at which these RFID tags can be detected. The test showed that the RFID signals from the low frequency tags at all depths were detected as soon as concrete was poured. The Ultra High Frequency tags placed at the 4" level could be detected 15 minutes after concrete was poured. The UHF tags at the 8" level could be detected after 30 minutes. The UHF tags at the 12" level took on an average 2 hours to be detected from the vicinity of the formwork. The greater the depth at which the ultra high frequency tag was buried the longer it took for it to be detected. The high frequency tags could be detected only at the 4" level. The reason the performance of the HF card degraded in concrete could be because it uses an aluminum foil antenna which is more susceptible to the environment changing the relative permeability. A copper wire antenna could have fared better in this condition, increasing the chances of detecting the tag. Moreover a passive tag was used. The read range and chances of detection could have been increased had an active tag been used. The power of the reader that was used was also very less which might have contributed to the tag not being detected. Among the tags that were used in the experiment it was found that low frequency tags was the tag that could be detected the earliest after concrete was poured into the forms. However, the maximum read range of the tag observed in the experiment was 20" which is too small a distance to be used on an actual construction site.

The objective of the proposed research is to design and develop a series of radio frequency identification (RFID) tag structures that exhibit good performance characteristics with cost optimization and can be realized on flexible substrates such as liquid crystal polymer (LCP), paper-based substrate and magnetic composite material for conformal applications. The demand for flexible RFID tags has recently increased tremendously due to the requirements of automatic identification in various areas. Several major challenges existing in today's RFID technologies need to be addressed before RFID can eventually march into everyone's daily life, such as how to design high performance tag antennas with effective impedance matching for passive RFID IC chips to optimize the power performance, how to fabricate ultra-low-cost RFID tags in order to facilitate mass production, how to integrate sensors with passive RFID tags for pervasive sensing applications, and how to realize battery-free active RFID tags in which changing battery is not longer needed. In this research, different RFID tag designs are realized on flexible substrates. The design techniques presented set the framework for answering these technical challenges for which, the focus will be on RFID tag structure design, characterization and optimization from the perspectives of both costs involved and technical constraints.

As the size and power consumption of microelectronic circuits continues to decrease, passively-powered sensors promise to come to the forefront of commercial electronics. One of the most promising technologies that could realize this goal is backscatter sensing. Backscatter sensors could harvest power from and modulate data onto an impinging carrier waveform. Currently radio frequency identification (RFID) technology passively powers itself and transmits statically stored data. However, this technology has two major weaknesses: lack of resiliency against narrowband interference and slow data rates. Both of these issues could be detrimental in sensing applications. This thesis will lay out a method for addressing both of these weaknesses through a unique application of spread spectrum encoding. Instead of spread spectrum being viewed as the multiplication of an already encoded data sequence with a periodic pseudorandom sequence, each sequence could be viewed in an aperiodic manner, where a single period of a pseudorandom sequence represents a data symbol. In this manner, backscatter sensors not only benefit from the increased resiliency that spread spectrum provides, but also can have higher data rates, since multiple bits can be encoded on a single symbol and multiple nodes can be read simultaneously, using spread spectrum multiple access techniques. In this thesis, 63-chip and 255-chip Kasami sequences, as well as 127-chip Gold sequences, will be analyzed for their use in various aperiodic direct sequence spread spectrum/multiple access system configurations (systems that have up to three nodes and use up to four different aperiodic sequences per node to represent different symbols). For each different configuration, near-"ideal" code configurations/rotations will be determined for use in the system.