Near Zero Energy RF and Sensor Operations (N-ZERO)
Abstract
The Near Zero Power RF and Sensor Operations (N-ZERO) program will develop and demonstrate the technologies required to extend the lifetimes of remotely-deployed sensors from months to years. Today's state-of-the-art sensors can be pre-placed and remain dormant until awoken by an external trigger or stimulus. However, the active electronics that monitor for external triggers consume power, limiting sensor lifetimes to between weeks and months. N-ZERO seeks to replace these electronics with passive or extremely low-power devices that continuously monitor the environment and wake up active electronics upon detection of a specific trigger. This would eliminate or significantly reduce standby power consumption, ensuring that sensor lifetimes are limited only by the power required to process and communicate confirmed events. In doing so, N-ZERO could enable wireless sensors with drastically increased mission life and help meet DoD's unfulfilled need for a persistent, event-driven sensing capability. N-ZERO's applied research component will focus on developing radio frequency (RF) communications and physical sensor systems that use energy from an external trigger to collect, process, and detect useful information while rejecting spurious signals and noise. The N-ZERO program moves to Project ELT-02, Beyond Scaling Technologies, in FY 2019.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Accomplishment
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2020
- Source ID
- 54e2a7894170765a7fb0facd0aa86c9a
Related Documents
- Root: ELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY