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E-WEHP: A Batteryless Embedded Sensor-Platform Wirelessly Powered From Ambient Digital-TV Signals

2013; IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society; Volume: 61; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1109/tmtt.2013.2258168

1557-9670

Rushi Vyas, Benjamin B. Cook, Yoshihiro Kawahara, Manos M. Tentzeris,

Innovative Energy Harvesting Technologies

The use of digital television broadcasting standards has resulted in transmission of perpetually on wireless digital-TV signals over the air at wider bandwidths in ultrahigh-frequency bands for high-definition video and audio broadcasts to TV and smart phones. This paper presents a unique embedded wireless energy-harvesting prototype (E-WEHP) that exploits the unique makeup of ambient digital-TV signals, and scavenges wireless power from them at distance of over 6.3 km from the TV broadcast source. The harvested wireless power is successfully used to power and sustain a 16-bit embedded microcontroller for sensing and machine-to-machine applications without the use of batteries. The E-WEHP uses a miniaturized planar log-periodic antenna and RF-dc charge-pump circuit with maximum sensitivities of $-$ 14.6 and $-{\hbox{18.86 dBm}}$ and an embedded firmware-based power management scheme to power microcontroller peripherals from different types of ambient digital-TV signals.