Synchronous Wearable Wireless Body Sensor Network Composed of Autonomous Textile Nodes

Sensors

Peter Vanveerdeghem²  Patrick Van Torre²  Christiaan Stevens¹  Jos Knockaert¹ 

[1] Department of Industrial System and Product Design (ISP), Ghent University, Graaf Karel de Goedelaan 5, 8500 Kortrijk, Belgium; E-Mails:;Department of Information Technology (INTEC), Ghent University, St. Pietersnieuwstraat 41, 9000 Ghent, Belgium; E-Mails:

关键词: wireless sensors;    body-centric;    diversity;    ISM band;    textile antennas;    situational awareness;    event detection;   

DOI  :  10.3390/s141018583

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

A novel, fully-autonomous, wearable, wireless sensor network is presented, where each flexible textile node performs cooperative synchronous acquisition and distributed event detection. Computationally efficient situational-awareness algorithms are implemented on the low-power microcontroller present on each flexible node. The detected events are wirelessly transmitted to a base station, directly, as well as forwarded by other on-body nodes. For each node, a dual-polarized textile patch antenna serves as a platform for the flexible electronic circuitry. Therefore, the system is particularly suitable for comfortable and unobtrusive integration into garments. In the meantime, polarization diversity can be exploited to improve the reliability and energy-efficiency of the wireless transmission. Extensive experiments in realistic conditions have demonstrated that this new autonomous, body-centric, textile-antenna, wireless sensor network is able to correctly detect different operating conditions of a firefighter during an intervention. By relying on four network nodes integrated into the protective garment, this functionality is implemented locally, on the body, and in real time. In addition, the received sensor data are reliably transferred to a central access point at the command post, for more detailed and more comprehensive real-time visualization. This information provides coordinators and commanders with situational awareness of the entire rescue operation. A statistical analysis of measured on-body node-to-node, as well as off-body person-to-person channels is included, confirming the reliability of the communication system.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.