Devices and Methods for Local- and Remote-processing Bodycentric Internet of Things Systems

Introduction - The Internet of Things (IoT) is an increasingly widespread paradigm based on the pervasive presence of things that are empowered to communicate and interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal. IoT systems are present in a big part of everyday lives, ranging from the automatic inventory in warehouses to smart houses. In particular, IoT systems working in close proximity to the human body are currently under study for a wide array of applications. This recently introduced type of systems can be referred to as bodycentric IoT (hereafter, B-IoT; also known as body-area IoT, or body-area network (BAN)-IoT), which can be defined as the set of all IoT systems that include body-worn wireless connected things. In other words, the B-IoT systems are all the IoT systems involving wireless wearable devices. The B-IoT is defined by the utilized hardware and position, unlike other application-based classifications, for example, the healthcare IoT (H-IoT) or the internet of trees (IoTr). Since wearable devices are increasingly widespread, B-IoT is also more and more common and investigated for healthcare, safety and defense. The B-IoT systems can be categorized into two classes based on their data processing local and remote. Local systems exploit short-range wireless protocols having radio ranges in the order of tens of meters as BLE (Bluetooth low energy) and RFID (radiofrequency identification), whereas remote systems employ ranges of hundreds of meters or more, eventually combined with short-range wireless technologies. In this last case, the long-range protocol is exploited to transmit data gathered locally; an example of such a B-IoT application is the telemonitoring through wearable diagnostic devices to a concentrator via a long-range protocol. The biometric data are returned to the user and forwarded to a control center for infectious diseases control. However, the classic application-defined approach to the IoT overlooks many characteristics that are typical of the B-IoT, such as the size and comfort requirements or the powering issue. An overview of B-IoT as a whole is complex and currently missing, whereas the in-depth analysis of the B-IoT could greatly help designing future devices since the issues to be faced are closely related. This dissertation aims to analyze the B-IoT class of devices regarding both local and remote processing systems. Two technologies are considered: RFID (radiofrequency identifications) for local and LPWANs (low-power wide-area networks) for remote processing. Particularly, this work focuses on passive RFID tags and the Long-Range (LoRa) LPWAN protocol. By considering the literature on the uses and case studies of both technologies, the bodycentric links of B-IoT are comprehensively analyzed.