IEEE JOURNAL OF RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION, VOL. 1, NO.

2, JUNE 2017 115

Self-Powered Multi-Port UHF

RFID Tag-Based-Sensor
Abdulhadi Ebrahim Abdulhadi, Member, IEEE, and Tayeb A. Denidni, Senior Member, IEEE

Abstract—In this paper, multi-port UHF RFID tag-based as a reference signal, while the other is used as a sensor node.
sensor for wireless identification and sensing applications is The reference node has a common RFID tag configuration,
presented. Two RFID chips, one with attached sensor and the while different approaches are adopted to implement the sensor
other without, are incorporated in a single tag antenna with
two excitation ports. The chip with the integrated sensor (sen- node in [2] and [5]–[14].
sor port) transmits a signal impacted by the sensed temperature The sensed physical quantity is determined from the ratio
or humidity, while the other RFID chip serves as the reference of the minimum power from the reader required to activate the
signal (reference port) transmitter in the sensing process. The reference and sensor nodes, or the power ratio of the signals
proposed tag-based sensor is fabricated and experimentally eval- received from reference and the sensor nodes. These values
uated. The measured results demonstrate that the sensed data can
be extracted using a commercial RFID reader by recording and are then compared to benchmark laboratory experiments with
comparing the difference in the reader output power required to the same tags, RFID chips and similar sensors [2], [5]–[14].
power up the reference port and the power required to power In [2] and [6]–[12], the tag antennas are often dipole topology.
the sensor ports. To improve the reading range of the proposed Due to their omnidirectional radiation, these types of anten-
sensor, a dual-port solar powered RFID sensor is also presented. nas are influenced by the characteristics of the identification
The reading range of the sensor is increased by two times com-
pared to a similar prototype without solar energy harvesting. object, and their resonance frequency, input impedance, radi-
The experimental evaluation demonstrates that the proposed tag- ation pattern and efficiency all degrade, especially when they
based sensor can be easily integrated with a resistive humidity are mounted on metallic surfaces or in close proximity to the
or temperature sensor for a low-cost solution to detect the heat human body [13]. These changes in the tag antenna charac-
or humidity exposure of sensitive items for several applications teristics affect the reference and the sensor nodes’ signals,
such as supply chains and construction structures.
reducing the sensing accuracy, [13]. To overcome this problem,
Index Terms—UHF RFID tag based-sensor, multi-port patch in [13], patch antennas have also been used for RFID sensors
antenna for UHF RFID tag, RFID tag for wireless identification but still in a multiple tag arrangement [2], [5]–[13].
and sensing applications, solar powered RFID tag-based sensor,
RFID humidity, temperature sensors. To reduce the cost, and the overall size of the developed
sensor architecture, the sensor and reference ports must be
integrated in one ordinary RFID tag. Including both refer-
ence and sensor nodes in the same antenna makes it possible
I. I NTRODUCTION to expose them to identical environmental conditions such as
FID technology has recently been employed in sensor temperature. In addition, this ensures similar power levels for
R applications that require low-cost low-power wireless
nodes with radio identification and sensing capabilities [1]–[5].
switches on the RFID chips, since a large separation between
the sensor and reference nodes increases the risk of dissimilar-
Utilizing low-cost with long life time passive RFID tag-based ity in the received powers due to propagation path variations.
sensor technology as an effective and reliable way for tracking In this type of sensor architecture, the sensor nodes also
and monitoring excess heat and humidity for several consumer limit the reading rang of the whole system, e.g., 1 m [6]. To
items is gaining great interest in the scientific and industrial increase the range, the sensor nodes’ threshold power should
domains. Examples of low-cost RFID tag-based sensors that be enhanced.
use off-the-shelf RFID chips and readers have been introduced In this paper, a multi-port RFID tag-based sensor, operat-
in [2] and [6]–[15]. The challenges in developing these types ing at the 902-928 MHZ North American frequency band,
of sensors include designing suitable tag antennas and accurate is proposed. The proposed tag antennas are incorporated
determination of the sensed physical quantity (e.g., temper- with multiple RFID chips (RI-UHF-IC116-00) provided by
ature, humidity, or permittivity) by using commercial RFID Texas Instruments, with power sensitivity of -13 dBm and
readers. In [2] and [6]–[13], a pair of RFID tag antennas are input impedances of 8.2 − j61 at the operation frequencies
employed for identification and sensing; one of the tags serves of 915 MHz, respectively. For a maximum power transfer
between the RFID chips and the antennas, inductively-coupled
Manuscript received January 7, 2017; revised June 17, 2017; accepted
August 10, 2017. Date of publication August 16, 2017; date of current version loop and inset coupled feeds are integrated in each antenna
December 28, 2017. (Corresponding author: Abdulhadi Ebrahim Abdulhadi.) layout. One port in each antenna is dedicated for attaching
The authors are with the Department of Electrical and Computer a resistive sensor as a load in parallel with the RFID chip.
Engineering, Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique, Montreal, QC
H5A 1K6, Canada (e-mail: abdulhadi.abdulhadi@emt.inrs.ca). Few normal resistors are used as an alternate way to rep-
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/JRFID.2017.2739202 resent the resistive sensor in simulations and measurements.
2469-7281 c 2017 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.

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116 IEEE JOURNAL OF RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION, VOL. 1, NO. 2, JUNE 2017

The proposed tag-based sensor is fabricated and experimen-

tally evaluated using a commercial RFID test system. These
tests show that the designed RFID tag sensor can read a
resistance variation of between 20 to 2K, which is equiv-
alent to the resistance’s variation of the humidity sensor (a
write once read many WORM [6]) when there is a humidity
change from 20% to 80%, or to the temperature sensors (NTC
Thermistors [16]) whose resistances change from 1.9K
(at 00 C) up to 20.86 (at 1450 C). To improve the reading
range of the sensor, a dual-port solar powered RFID-tag-
enabled sensor is also fabricated and experimentally evaluated.
The measured results demonstrate that the reading range of the
dual-port solar powered RFID tag-enabled sensor is increased
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the proposed RFID tag-based sensor.
by two times compared to a similar prototype without solar
energy harvesting. Compared to the author’s earlier work on
multi-port tag antenna [1], the proposed tag-based sensor is
The power received by the reader can be expressed by a
simpler, as it can be integrated with low-cost passive sen-
radar equation [11]:
sors without any additional discrete electronic components to
 
measure different parameters (e.g., temperature or humidity). λ0 4 2
This paper is organized as follows. The sensing principle of PR = GR (θ, ϕ, ψ)G2T (θ, ϕ, ψ)τ Pt ηp ρ(ψ) (3)
4π d
the proposed multi-port tag antenna is described in Section II.
Next, the design and simulation results of the proposed tag where ρ(ψ) is the modulation efficiency of the tag, which is
antenna are presented in Section III. Experimental evaluations a function of the antenna and chip impedances [22]. It is also
of the assembled tag-based sensor are provided in Section IV, related to the tag radar cross section as identified in [22]. The
followed by, a new multi-port solar powered RFID sensor that power received by the tag to activate the microchip or to be
is described and experimentally evaluated in Section V. Finally, scattered by the tag is a function of the physical characteristics
the conclusions are presented in Section VI. of the target where the tag is attached. Thus, any change in
the target parameters causes a change in the power received by
the tag as well as in the scattered power that is received by the
II. P RINCIPLE OF THE M ULTI P ORT RFID reader. By detecting these changes, the target properties can
TAG BASED -S ENSOR D ESIGN be monitored in real time. However, preliminary laboratory
Passive RFID tags do not contain any power sources; experiments are needed to generate a calibrated reading of
Instead, they harvest the power required to operate the IC from the backscattered signal from the sensor tag or the minimum
the RF signal transmitted from the reader [17]. The amount power required from the reader to activate the tag.
of the power harvested by the tag strongly depends on the The schematic diagram of the proposed multi-port RFID
tag-antenna performance and the matching network between tag based sensor is shown in Fig. 1. The sensor port is
the chip and the tag antenna. The chip’s impedance is highly integrated with a resistive moisture or resistive temperature
capacitive (Zin = RChip − jXChip ); for the maximum power sensor, [6] and [16], while the other port (the reference port)
transfer conditions, the antenna input impedance must be con- is perfectly matched to the tag antenna. Any change in the
∗ ).
jugate matched to the microchip impedance (ZAntenna = ZChip resistance of the sensor due to humidity or temperature varia-
The power transferred to the chip by the tag antenna can be tion introduces a mismatch between the antenna and the sensor
represented as [11]: port. The reader should then transmit a higher power level to
 2 activate the sensor port compared to that required for the refer-
λ0 ence port. Since the threshold power of the chips (PC−threshold )
PTag = GR (θ, ϕ, ψ)GT (θ, ϕ, ψ)τ Pt ηp (1)
4π d is almost the same for the same types of chips and the ref-
erence and sensor ports are integrated in the same tag, the
where λ0 is the free space wavelength, d denotes the dis-
parameter of reader-to-tag distance can be dropped by calcu-
tance between the reader and the tag, GT , and GR represent
lating the ratio of the required minimum transmit power (Ptmin )
the tag and reader antenna gain, ψ is the environmental
to activate the two chips (PTag ≥ PC−threshold ) (sensor and ref-
parameter that could affect the gain (i.e., material [18], humid-
erence ports) using Eq. (1). The calibration power up curve
ity [13] or [19], [20], temperature [21]), and τ is the power
at any arbitrary distance from the reader can be obtained as
transmission coefficient of the tag, defined as:
follows:
4RChip RAntenna (ψ) Ptsensor τreferencePort
τ=  (2) Prelative = = (4)
ZChip + ZAntenna (ψ)2 tmin
Ptreference τsensorPort
The other parameters in Eq. (1) are Pt , the power transmit- By measuring this power ratio, it is possible to map it to the
ted from the RFID reader, and ηp , the polarization mismatch sensor data and thereby the determine humidity or temperature
between the reader and the tag antenna. at the tag location.

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ABDULHADI AND DENIDNI: SELF-POWERED MULTI-PORT UHF RFID TAG-BASED-SENSOR 117

Fig. 2. Geometry of the proposed patch antenna-based sensor. All dimensions

in millimeters (LPatch = 83, WPatch = 79.6, L = 126, W = 126, L1 = 18.6,
L2 = 21, L3 = 1.7, L4 = 11, L5 = 3.1, L6 = 1.5, L7 = 4.6, L8 = 1,
L9 = 1, W = 79.6, W1 = 0.6, W2 = 0.5, W3 = 0.5, h1 = 0.55, h2 = 0.35,
d = 0.2.

Fig. 3. Power transfer coefficient at the port of the proposed sensor with
III. UHF RFID S ENSOR TAG D ESIGN different resistors.
The tag antenna shown in Fig. 2 is designed and fabricated
using a single layer substrate, Rogers RO4350B (εr = 3.66)
Adding the resistive sensor in parallel with the sensor port
with h = 1.524 mm to operate at the North American UHF
introduces a mismatch (| | is larger than zero) between the
RFID band (902-928 MHz). The length of the patch antenna
antenna and the RFID chip. Thus, the power harvested from
is approximately one-half of a wavelength at the operating
the RFID reader signals will not be completely transferred to
frequency of 915 MHz yielding Lpatch = 83mm and the width
the chip circuitry, as part of it will be reflected (the power
of Wpatch = 79.6mm. The overall dimensions of the tag includ-
transfer coefficient τ = 1 − | |2 ). Compared to the reference
ing the ground plane are 126 mm x 126mm. To further reduce
port that is perfectly conjugate matched to the tag antenna, the
the footprint, the patch antenna is backed by an EBG struc-
reader requires to transmit higher power to activate the sensor
ture as described by Abdulhadi et al. [23] and then redesigned
port. According to Eq. (6) the reader will not be able to acti-
with multiple feeds. In this manner, a size reduction of almost
vate the sensor port when (| | = 1, ZSensor = 0), while the best
70% (59mm x 79 mm) is obtained for the multi-port patch tag
case to activate the sensor port (perfect conjugate matching)
antenna. Multiple RFID chips (RI-UHF-IC116-00 [24]) pro-
is when ( = 0, ZSensor = ∞). The proposed tag is simulated
vided by Texas Instruments are utilized. The power sensitivity
using an HFSS simulator where normal resistors (thick film
of the chip is -13 dBm and the input impedance is 8.2−j61 at
chip resistors CRCW0402) with different resistance values
915 MHz. The inductive loop and inset feed provide the conju-
(2k, 1k, 500, 200, 100, 50, and 20) are connected
gate match between the chips and the antenna ports. The port
one at a time in the inductive loop as an alternative way to
with an inset feed is chosen as the reference node. By chang-
represent a resistive sensor (e.g., a Write Once Read Many
ing the length of the inset feed (L1), the imaginary part of the
WORM [6] or an NTCLE100E3681JB0 thermistor [16]). The
input impedance is adjusted to yield a desired input impedance
calculated power transmission coefficient results using Eq. (6)
value. The real part is optimized by controlling the position
and the simulated power transmission coefficient of the tag
of the via inside the patch antenna [23]. The second chip is
with these resistors are presented in Fig. 3. In both calculations
connected to the antenna via an inductive loop. The size of the
using Eq. (6) and an HFSS simulator, the chip impedance is set
matching loop is adjusted to control the imaginary part, while
to be 8.2 − j61 (provided in the component data sheet [24]),
the distance between the antenna and the loop affects the real
and the results are calculated at the center frequency of
part [25]. The final dimensions of the inset feed and the loop,
North American band (915 MHz). As expected, when the
as shown in Fig.1, are optimized using an HFSS simulator.
resistor values that are connected in parallel with the RFID
The sensor can be directly connected to the tag antenna (in
chip, a mismatch between the chip and the antenna is intro-
series or in parallel) [6] or it can be inductively coupled to the
duced. The mismatch increases when the value of the resistor
tag [7]. In this prototype, the sensor is directly connected to
is decreased. There is a small variation in the power transmis-
the matching loop in parallel with the RFID chip (See Fig. 2).
sion coefficient at the reference port, but it is more than 94%
The reflection coefficient of this port as seen by the RFID
across the entire North American band. Thus, the reference
chip is [6]:
∗
port chip is expected to be activated with a minimum of power
(ZAntenna  ZSensor ) − ZChip transmitted from the reader, and changing the resistance val-
= (5)
(ZAntenna  ZSensor ) + ZChip ues at the sensor port does not have any impact as will be seen
If the tag antenna is designed to be conjugate matched to the from the power sensitivity measurement in the next section.
chip impedance (ZAntenna = ZChip∗ ), the reflection coefficient

( ) becomes: IV. RFID TAG BASED -S ENSOR E VALUATION

 2 A. Power Sensitivity Measurements
∗
− ZChip
=    2 (6) Since sensor operation is based on measuring the relative
2ZSensor Re ZChip + ZChip  activation power of the sensor and reference port chips, the

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118 IEEE JOURNAL OF RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION, VOL. 1, NO. 2, JUNE 2017

Fig. 5. Measured minimum transmit power required to activate RFID chip

Fig. 4. Tagformance measurement setup. at the sensor port with different resistance values.

power sensitivity measurement must be conducted in order

to generate the calibration curve of the power-up levels. In
addition, measuring the power sensitivity of the assembled tag
provides information about the optimum operation frequency.
Thus, any shifts in the resonance frequency because of antenna
fabrication tolerances or RFID chip impedance tolerances due
to parasitic effects, process variations or packaging can be
observed. This test used a commercial RFID measurement
system (Tagformance [26]). The measurement system is shown
in Fig. 4, where the reader is connected to a computer to
control the operation frequency band, the sweeping frequency
step, and the maximum output power. The measurement
system also includes a wide band circulator for monostatic Fig. 6. Measured minimum transmit power required to activate RFID chip
radar measurements with over 20 dB port isolation through at the reference port with different resistance values.
a range of 800 to 1000 MHz. Tagformance was selected to
perform the power sensitivity measurements because it covers
broad operation frequency bands compared to a commercial resistance is high (2k), while higher power (18.5 dBm) is
RFID reader, e.g., GAO 216010 [27], which only operates in needed when the sensor resistance is very low (20). The
a narrow band from 865 to 868 MHz, European band, and required transmit power of the reference port is also measured
902 to 928 MHz, North America band. With this commercial for different resistance values connected at the sensor port.
reader (e.g., GAO 216010), the optimum operation frequency The measured results are presented in Fig. 6. The changes in
can not be predicted if it shifts out of the reader’s operational the resistance values at the sensor port cause small changes
bands. The tag is placed on the top of the foam holder at in the transmit power required for activation (e.g., 1.5 dBm at
a 0.45 m distance from the reader, as shown in Fig. 4. The 915 MHz when R = 2k, and -0.98dBm when R = 20) of
power sensitivity for the integrated RFID chips is then mea- the reference port due to the coupling effect between the two
sured with different thick-film chip resistors (CRCW0402), ports. These changes are already included in the calibration
i.e., 2k, 1k, 500, 200, 100, 50, and 20, soldered curve of the power-up levels and will not degrade the sensor
one at a time for each port and each test to represent the resis- accuracy. It can be seen that the optimum operation frequency
tive sensors. This process allows the power sensitivity of the of the proposed tag occurs at the center frequency of the
sensor to be measured without the need for a climate room. North American band, 915 MHz. At this operation frequency,
The proposed sensor is measured across the 800-1000 MHz a minimum transmitted power of -0.98 dBm is required to
frequency band. The system starts by transmitting low power activate the RFID chip at the reference port. Thus, the differ-
(-5 dBm) and then increases the output power by 0.1 dBm ential power-up curve can be calculated using Eq. (4) at the
until the reader detects a tag response. The minimum trans- operation frequency of (915 MHz), as presented in Fig. 7.
mit power needed to activate the sensor port was recorded for
different resistance values and is plotted in Fig. 5. B. Reading Range Measurements
It can be observed that the minimum power required from The other important parameter in evaluating an RFID tag is
the reader (Pt ) to activate the sensor port is inversely propor- its maximum reading range. A tag’s reading range can be eas-
tional to the sensor resistance. The sensor port is activated ily measured using any commercial RFID reader. The same
with a transmit minimum power of 2.5dBm when the sensor commercially-available measurement system (Tagformance)

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ABDULHADI AND DENIDNI: SELF-POWERED MULTI-PORT UHF RFID TAG-BASED-SENSOR 119

Fig. 9. Measured realized gain for the proposed tag-based sensor.

Fig. 7. Measured transmit power difference between sensor port and reference
port at 915 MHz.
TABLE I
P HYSICAL C HARACTERISTICS OF T HERMISTORS - NTCLE100E3681JB0

The measured front-to-back ratio is 9.8 dB at 915 MHz. The

realized antenna gain can be determined by using the power
method presented in [28]. The realized gain of the proposed
tag is presented in Fig. 9. The realized gain of the proposed
Fig. 8. Measured radiation pattern of the proposed sensor at 915 MHz.
tag antenna is 4.8 dB at 915 MHz.

used above to measure the power consumption is used here D. Sensor Measurement Results
for measuring the reading range. The maximum reading range
In the first subsection of this tag-based sensor evaluation
(with an EIRP of 3.28 W at the reference port) using the
(Power Sensitivity Measurements), the proposed tags showed
proposed tags is 9 m. The calibrated curves of the differential
that they can successfully operate with a resistive sensor with
power-up levels of the proposed sensor with a resistive sen-
a range of 2K to 20. Currently, many different passive,
sor are measured at a distance of 0.45 m from the reader. A
compact and low-cost sensors that have similar resistance vari-
solar powered tag-based sensor was developed to enhance the
ations are available and suitable for direct integration with
reading range of the whole system, as explained in the next
the proposed tag antennas. An example of a printed low-cost
section.
humidity or temperature sensor is a 1-bit write-once-read-
many (WORM) presented in [5]–[7]. In our measurements, the
C. Radiation Pattern Measurements proposed tag is integrated with another sensor available in our
RFID tag antennas are loaded with the complex impedance lab (Thermistors - NTC) [16] that has a similar resistance vari-
of RFID chips, which is highly capacitive. This is not the stan- ation range to those described in [5]–[7], i.e., 1.9K at 0◦ C
dard setting (50) in conventional pattern measurements, and to 196 at 60◦ C. These types of sensors are not equipped
therefore it is important to investigate the radiation pattern of with discrete electronic components that would increase the
the RFID tag antenna with an assembled and activated chip cost of the integrated sensor unit in the RFID tag; mak-
to observe any pattern deterioration. The Tagformance mea- ing them suitable for integration in a variety of consumer
surement system is used in an anechoic chamber to extract products in the proposed RFID tag sensor designs described
the radiation pattern from the power sensitivity measurements earlier. Some of the physical characteristics of Thermistors
without any physical feed connection [26]. The radiation pat- - NTCLE100E3681JB0 are summarized in Table I. From
tern of the proposed tag antenna at the operation frequency of Table I, it can be seen that at room temperature 25◦ C, the
915 MHz is measured when both sensor and reference chips available sensor has a resistor value of 680. Since no climate
are connected. The measured results are presented in Fig. 8. room was available during the time of these measurements, the

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120 IEEE JOURNAL OF RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION, VOL. 1, NO. 2, JUNE 2017

Fig. 10. Measured minimum transmit power required to activate RFID chip Fig. 12. Measured required minimum power for the reference and sensor
at the sensor port of the proposed RFID sensor with Thermistor - NTC NTC ports of the tag in Fig. 11 attached to a box containing plastic items.
sensor.

Fig. 11. Measured packages with Thermistors- NTCLE100E3681JB0.

Fig. 13. Measured required minimum power for the reference and sensor
ports of the tag in Fig. 11 attached to a box containing metallic items.

temperature sensor was only used to extract the power sensi-

tivity of the proposed RFID sensor and to demonstrate the on the power sensitivity measurements, the tag is therefore
sensing principle of the RFID tag-based sensor operation, and first measured in free space and then attached to the two
not for the actual temperature measurements. The power sen- different packages. The measured results of the required min-
sitivities of the RFID chip at the sensor port and reference imum power for both ports in these two tests are presented
port are presented in Fig. 10. It can be seen that the sensor in Figs. 12 and 13. When the proposed sensor is attached to
port requires higher power than the reference port, and that the top of a box containing plastic items, the minimum power
the ratio of the power transmitted to the sensor port to that needed to activate the RFID chips at the reference and sen-
transmitted to the reference port, can be extracted to deter- sor ports are very close to those of pertinent ports in free
mine the temperature if a calibration table or a climate room standing tag measurements. Thus, the loading effects of these
are available. types of items are negligible. However, when the proposed
sensor is attached to the packages containing metallic objects,
a small change in the minimum power for RFID chip acti-
E. Power Sensitivity Measurements on Consumer Products vation is observed compared to the power required for free
To demonstrate the use of the proposed tags-based sensor, standing tags. For example, the required minimum power at
measurements were conducted using two different types of 920 MHz for a sensor port is 8.4 dBm in a free standing tag,
packages. The measurement system (Tagformance) described while it is 7 dBm when it is on the box containing metal-
in the earlier sections was also used to evaluate the lic cans. The measured transmitted power difference between
performance of the proposed sensor with two different types of the sensor port and the reference port of free standing tags is
consumer products. As shown in Fig. 11, the proposed sensor 8.45 dB, while it is 8.05 dB when it is located on the box of
is attached to a box (200 × 200 × 200mm) containing plastic metallic cans. Fig. 14 presents the loading effect of the two
items, and then the RFID tag is attached to a box that filled different packages on a sample monopole RFID tag described
with metallic cans. The tag is placed on top of the box at a in [29]. The loading effects of a box containing plastic items
distance of 0.45 m from the reader antenna of the measure- causes a large shift in the resonance frequency and increases
ment system. Since the principle method of sensing depends the required minimum power compared to the proposed RFID

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ABDULHADI AND DENIDNI: SELF-POWERED MULTI-PORT UHF RFID TAG-BASED-SENSOR 121

Fig. 15. Picture of the prototyped solar powered RFID tag-based sensor.
Fig. 14. Measured required minimum power for the monopole tag antenna
described in [29] placed to the top of a box containing plastic and metallic
items.

tag-based sensor. The monopole antenna tag has a dramatically

diminished performance when placed on the box containing
metallic cans. Therefore, it can be observed that the proposed
tag sensor is more immune to the loading effects of consumer
products compared to RFID tags that use wire antennas for
their sensor implementation [2], [5]–[14].

V. S OLAR P OWERED RFID TAG -BASED S ENSOR

As mentioned in the previous section, sensor data is
extracted from the power ratio described in Eq. (4). The power
sensitivity measurements also confirm that the introduced mis-
match due to the resistive sensor reduces the power sensitivity Fig. 16. Maximum reading range of the reference port with and without
of the sensor port, with the reading range of the sensor port external energy sources.
reduced accordingly. In fact, these types of sensors are gen-
eral only suitable for use in short range applications, e.g., of with and without being connected to the solar energy source.
1 m [6]. Nonetheless, the reading range of the proposed sen- First, the reading range of the RFID chip is measured with-
sors can be extended by improving the power sensitivity of out the external solar power source. Next, it is measured with
both the reference and the sensor ports. Therefore, an improved two different external power sources connected, one at time: a
design was developed herein. In this prototype, the power sen- small battery and the solar panel overlay. The measured read-
sitivity of the IC is increased by including an additional energy ing range results for the reference port are presented in Fig. 16.
source (solar cells [30]). A Monza X RFID chip with two The maximum reading range without any additional energy
pins for DC connection is used in the tag, which is designed source is obtained at 932 MHz (11.2 m), while with a small
to operate at the North American bandwidth (902 MHz to battery the maximum reading range is 25.6 m at 932 MHz
928 MHz). A Rogers RO4350B substrate (εr = 3.66 and 1.524 (with an EIRP of 3.28 W). When the solar panel is used to
thickness) is considered for implementing the tag antenna. At power up the RFID chip under typical indoor office illumina-
915 MHz, the length and width of the radiating patch is opti- tion conditions, a maximum reading range of 21.5 is achieved
mized by using an HFSS simulator, yielding L = 83 mm at 937 MHz (with an EIRP of 3.28 W). Due to the load-
and W = 82.8 mm. The inductive loop matching technique ing effect of the solar panel the maximum reading range is
is used to feed the RFID chip. The dimensions of the induc- shifted from 932 MHz to 937 MHz. These measurements were
tive loop are optimized for conjugate matching, resulting in repeated with a resistive thermal sensor, i.e., a Thermistor -
L1 = 18.8 mm, L2 = 8.5mm, d = 0.6 mm. A thin film of NTCE100E3221JB0, connected in parallel with the RFID chip
solar cells [31] are attached on the top of the patch antenna, as shown in Fig. 15. The measured results of the maximum
as shown in Fig. 15. The dimensions of the solar panel are reading range are presented in Fig. 17. The reading range of
2
64mm × 37mm × 0.2mm, yielding an active area of 23cm . As the sensor port without an additional energy source is 2.4 m
shown in Fig. 15, the DC+ and DC- of the solar panel are at 928 MHz. When the small battery and solar panel are used
connected to the RFID using tiny wires. to power up the RFID chip, the reading ranges are 5.4 m at
The same system (TagFormance) that was used in the 928 MHz and 4.6 m at 934 MHz, respectively. It can be clearly
previous tag measurements is utilized here to evaluate the observed that the effective reading range of the tag is almost
performance of the solar powered tag-based sensor. The read- doubled when an additional energy source is used to power
ing ranges for the reference and sensor ports are measured up the RFID chip.

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122 IEEE JOURNAL OF RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION, VOL. 1, NO. 2, JUNE 2017

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ABDULHADI AND DENIDNI: SELF-POWERED MULTI-PORT UHF RFID TAG-BASED-SENSOR 123

[23] A. E. Abdulhadi, H. M. Tehran, and R. Abhari, “Design and char- Tayeb A. Denidni (SM’04) received the M.Sc.
acterization of a miniaturized patch antenna for passive UHF RFID and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from
applications,” in Proc. IEEE/MTT-S Int. Microw. Symp. Dig., Montreal, Laval University, Quebec City, QC, Canada, in 1990
QC, Canada, 2012, pp. 1–3. and 1994, respectively. From 1994 to 2000, he
[24] SMT EPC Gen2 IC RI-UHF-IC116-00, Texas Instruments, Dallas, was a Professor with the Engineering Department,
TX, USA, Nov. 2016. [Online]. Available: http://media.digikey.com/ Universit du Quebec in Rimouski, Rimouski, QC,
pdf/Data%20Sheets/Texas%20Instruments%20PDFs/RI-UHG-IC116- Canada, where he founded the Telecommunications
00.pdf Laboratory. Since 2000, he has been with the Institut
[25] H. Choo and H. Ling, “Design of electrically small planar anten- National de la Recherche Scientifique (INRS),
nas using inductively coupled feed,” Electron. Lett., vol. 39, no. 22, Universit du Quebec, Montreal, QC, Canada. He
pp. 1563–1565, Oct. 2003. found RF Laboratory, INRS-EM, Montreal. He has
[26] Tagformance, Voyantic Ltd., Espoo, Finland, Nov. 2016. [Online]. a great experience with antenna design and he is leading a large research
Available: http://www.voyantic.com/index.php?trg=home group consisting of three research scientists, eight Ph.D. students, and two
[27] GAO RFID Inc. (Nov. 15, 2016). RFID Reader, GAO216010. [Online]. M.Sc. students. He served as a Principal Investigator on many research project
Available: http://www.gaorfid.com/RFID-PDF/216010.pdf sponsored By NSERC, FCI, and numerous industries. His current research
[28] S. Caizzone and G. Marrocco, “RFID grids: Part II—Experimentations,” areas of interest include reconfigurable antennas using EBG and FSS struc-
IEEE Trans. Antennas Propag., vol. 59, no. 8, pp. 2896–2904, tures, dielectric resonator antennas, metamaterial antennas, adaptive arrays,
Aug. 2011. switched multibeam antenna arrays, ultrawideband antennas, microwave, and
[29] A. E. Abdulhadi and R. Abhari, “Design and experimental evaluation development for wireless communications systems. From 2008 to 2010, he
of miniaturized monopole UHF RFID tag antennas,” IEEE Antennas served as an Associate Editor for the IEEE T RANSACTIONS ON A NTENNAS
Wireless Propag. Lett., vol. 11, pp. 248–251, 2012. P ROPAGATION. From 2005 to 2007, he served as an Associate Editor for the
[30] A. P. Sample, J. Braun, A. Parks, and J. R. Smith, “Photovoltaic IEEE A NTENNAS W IRELESS P ROPAGATION L ETTERS. Since 2015, he has
enhanced UHF RFID tag antennas for dual purpose energy harvesting,” been serving as an Associate Editor for IET Electronics Letters.
in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. RFID, Orlando, FL, USA, 2011, pp. 146–153.
[31] Flexible Thin-Film, Powerfilm Inc., Ames, IA, USA, Nov. 2016.
[Online]. Available: http://www.powerfilmsolar.com

Abdulhadi Ebrahim Abdulhadi was born in Bani

Walid “Al Rusaifa”, Libya. He received the B.Sc.
degree in microwave and radar engineering from
the Faculty of Electronic Engineering, Bani Walid
“Al Rusaifa”, in 2007, the M.Sc. degree in anten-
nas and electromagnetic engineering from Concordia
University, Montreal, QC, Canada, and the Ph.D.
degree from McGill University, Montreal. He is cur-
rently a Post-Doctoral Fellow with INRS, Montreal.
His research activity has been mostly focused on
the integration between sensors and RFID tags, the
realization of compact UHF RFID tags, electromagnetic bandgap structures,
multifeed tag antennas, integrated multiantenna systems, solar-energy-assisted
sensor-enhanced UHF RFID tags, and new techniques for tag characterization,
optimization, and design.

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