NETWORK ARCHITECTURE, RADIO FREQUENCY BASED ASSET TRACKING AND/OR LOCATION ESTIMATION METHODS AND SYSTEMS
First Claim
1. A system, comprising:
- a number of edge gateways distributed about a space, each edge gateway comprising an edge gateway processor and an edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system, wherein each edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system is configured to communicate via a first frequency band and a second frequency band;
a plurality of radio frequency-enabled nodes distributed about the space, wherein each of the plurality of radio frequency-enabled nodes comprises;
a node processor; and
a node radio frequency transceiver configured to receive and transmit radio frequency signals via the first frequency band; and
a fog gateway comprising a fog gateway radio frequency transceiver and a fog gateway processor, the fog gateway radio frequency transceiver configured to communicate via the second frequency band with each edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system;
wherein each edge gateway;
has a respective radio frequency coverage area within the space, at least with respect to the first frequency band,is configured by the edge gateway processor to communicate with a plurality of the radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective radio frequency coverage area via the first frequency band; and
is configured by the edge gateway processor to transmit an aggregated message including an identifier of each of one or more of the radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective coverage area, based on a node asset message received from each of the one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective coverage area, each received node asset message comprising;
an identifier of each respective one or more of the radio frequency-enabled nodes,an identifier of a radio frequency-enabled tag obtained from a radio frequency signal received from the radio frequency-enabled tag by each of the respective one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective edge gateway'"'"'s coverage area, anda measured signal attribute of the signal received from the radio frequency-enabled tag by the respective one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective edge gateway'"'"'s coverage area; and
wherein the fog gateway is configured by the fog gateway processor to;
receive a respective aggregated message from each of a plurality of respective edge gateways; and
parse the received aggregated messages to obtain a node identifier tuple for use in a determination of location of the radio frequency-enabled tag within the space.
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Abstract
Radio frequency-enabled nodes, in an example asset tracking system, receive a basic message including an asset tracking tag identifier from an asset tag. The nodes measure a signal attribute of the received message; and each receiving node transmits a node asset message including the asset tag identifier, a respective node identifier, and the measured signal attribute. Edge gateways each receive one or more node asset messages transmitted by some number of the radio frequency-enabled nodes and rank respective node identifiers based on the measured signal attribute. Each edge gateway forwards an aggregated message to a fog gateway, which parses data from the aggregated messages to form a node identifier tuple identifying at least three nodes near the asset tag. Ordered identifiers from the tuple and known locations of the identified nearby nodes can then be processed to estimate of the location of the asset tag.
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Citations
18 Claims
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1. A system, comprising:
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a number of edge gateways distributed about a space, each edge gateway comprising an edge gateway processor and an edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system, wherein each edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system is configured to communicate via a first frequency band and a second frequency band; a plurality of radio frequency-enabled nodes distributed about the space, wherein each of the plurality of radio frequency-enabled nodes comprises; a node processor; and a node radio frequency transceiver configured to receive and transmit radio frequency signals via the first frequency band; and a fog gateway comprising a fog gateway radio frequency transceiver and a fog gateway processor, the fog gateway radio frequency transceiver configured to communicate via the second frequency band with each edge gateway radio frequency transceiver system; wherein each edge gateway; has a respective radio frequency coverage area within the space, at least with respect to the first frequency band, is configured by the edge gateway processor to communicate with a plurality of the radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective radio frequency coverage area via the first frequency band; and is configured by the edge gateway processor to transmit an aggregated message including an identifier of each of one or more of the radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective coverage area, based on a node asset message received from each of the one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective coverage area, each received node asset message comprising; an identifier of each respective one or more of the radio frequency-enabled nodes, an identifier of a radio frequency-enabled tag obtained from a radio frequency signal received from the radio frequency-enabled tag by each of the respective one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective edge gateway'"'"'s coverage area, and a measured signal attribute of the signal received from the radio frequency-enabled tag by the respective one or more radio frequency-enabled nodes within the respective edge gateway'"'"'s coverage area; and wherein the fog gateway is configured by the fog gateway processor to; receive a respective aggregated message from each of a plurality of respective edge gateways; and parse the received aggregated messages to obtain a node identifier tuple for use in a determination of location of the radio frequency-enabled tag within the space. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. A method, comprising steps of:
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receiving, at three or more radio frequency-enabled nodes distributed about a space, a basic message transmitted by an asset tracking tag, the basic message including an identifier of the asset tracking tag and a basic message sequence number; at each of the three or more radio frequency-enabled nodes, measuring a signal attribute of the received basic message and associating the measured signal attribute with a node identifier of the respective radio frequency-enabled node making the signal attribute measurement; transmitting, by each of the three or more radio frequency-enabled nodes, a node asset message including the asset tracking tag identifier, the basic message sequence number, the node identifier of the respective one of the three or more radio frequency-enabled nodes transmitting the respective node asset message, and the measured signal attribute of the basic message measured by the respective one of the three or more radio frequency-enabled nodes transmitting the respective node asset message; at each of two or more edge gateways; receiving a respective transmitted node asset message transmitted by one or more of the radio frequency-enabled nodes, and in response determining a number of the respective node identifiers of nodes nearest to the asset tracking tag based on the signal attribute of the basic message measured by the one or more nodes; and forwarding to a fog gateway of the space, an aggregated message including the asset tracking tag identifier, the basic message sequence number, a list of the number of node identifiers in association with respective highest measured signal attribute values, and an identifier of the edge gateway; and parsing aggregated messages from the two or more edge gateways to remove any duplicate data and obtain a node identifier tuple; and estimating location of the radio frequency-enabled tag within the space based at least in part on node identifiers in the node identifier tuple. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16, 17, 18)
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Specification