Exploring LoRa for Sensing

Abstract

Wireless sensing received a great amount of attention in recent years and various wireless technologies have been exploited for sensing, including WiFi [1], RFID [2], ultrasound [3], 60 GHz mmWave [4] and visible light [5]. The key advantage of wireless sensing over traditional sensing is that the target does not need to be equipped with any sensor(s) and the wireless signal itself is being used for sensing. Exciting new applications have been enabled, such as passive localization [6] and contactless human activity sensing [7]. While promising in many aspects, one key limitation of current wireless sensing techniques is the very small sensing range. This is because while both direct path and reflection path signals are used for communication, only the weak target-reflection signals can be used for sensing. Take Wi-Fi as an example: the communication range can reach 20 to 50 meters indoors but its sensing range is merely 4 to 8 meters. This small range further limits the through-wall sensing capability of Wi-Fi. On the other hand, many applications do require long-range and through-wall sensing capability. In a fire rescue scenario, the sensing device cannot be placed close to the building, and the long-range through-wall sensing capabilities are critical for detecting people deep inside the building. Table I summarizes the sensing range of existing wireless technologies. We can see that long-range through-wall sensing is still missing with wireless sensing.