Passive RFID system and method

• US 8,717,147 B2
• Filed: 09/21/2010
• Issued: 05/06/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 12/18/2009
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute
• Original Assignee: Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute
• Inventors: Bae, Ji Hoon, Quan, Cheng Hao, Lee, Dong Han, Park, Chan Won, Choi, Won Kyu, Cho, Kwang Soo, Park, Man Sik, Choi, Gil Young, Chae, Jong Suk
• Primary Examiner(s): Zimmerman, Brian
• Assistant Examiner(s): NGUYEN, LAURA N
• Application Number:
  US12/886,689
• Publication Number:
  US 20110148585A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,323 Days
• Field of Search: 340 101- 106, 340/572.2, 340/572.4, 370/431, 370458-462, 375/270, 375/277, 375296-298, 375/301
• US Class Current: 340/10.3
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/0008 General problems related to the reading of electronic memory record carriers, independent of its reading method, e.g. power transfer
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10069 the collision being resolved in the frequency domain, e.g. by hopping from one frequency to the other frequency hopping or spread spectrum techniques H04B7/00

Abstract

Disclosed are a passive RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) system and method capable of recognizing a great deal of tags at a high speed. A reader of a passive RFID system, including: a processor dividing slots and subchannels to configure a round, recognizing subchannels that are not involved in a collision and interference by the slots, and changing the subchannels that are not involved in a collision and interference, into a sleep state; a transmission unit encoding a command generated through the processor, performing an amplitude jitter modulation on the encoded command, and transmitting the modulated command; and a reception unit acquiring and demodulating tag signals received through a plurality of subchannels by the slots, and providing the demodulated tag signals to the processor.

Claims

1. A reader of a passive RFID system, the reader comprising:

a processor dividing slots and subchannels to configure a round, recognizing subchannels that are not involved in a collision and interference by the slots, and changing a tag of the subchannels that are not involved in a collision and interference, into a sleep state;

a transmission unit encoding a command generated through the processor, performing an amplitude jitter modulation on the encoded command, and transmitting the modulated command; and

a reception unit acquiring and demodulating tag signals received through a plurality of subchannels by the slots, and providing the demodulated tag signals to the processor, so that the processor can recognize the subchannels that are not involved in a collision and interference, wherein the transmission unit comprises;

a message generation unit generating a message having a command generated through the processor;

an encoding unit encoding the message generated by the message generation unit to generate I and Q channel signals; and

an amplitude jitter modulation unit performing an amplitude jitter modulation on the I and Q channel signals and outputting modulated signals to an antenna,

wherein the amplitude jitter modulation unit comprises;

a phase delay phase-delaying a carrier signal by 90 degrees and outputting the same;

first and second transmission mixers mixing the I channel signal in the carrier signal and the Q channel signal in the output signal from the phase delay;

first and second attenuators attenuating the amplitude of the output signals of the first and second transmission mixers;

first and second adders adding an output signal from the phase delay to an output signal from the first attenuator and the carrier signal to an output signal from the second attenuator; and

a third adder adding the output signals of the first and second adders.

2. The reader of claim 1, wherein the amplitude jitter modulation unit may receive a slot command requesting the providing of a tag signal from a tag that currently uses a slot and a sleep command changing a tag of a subchannel that is not involved in a collision and interference into a sleep state, as the I and Q channel signals, simultaneously modulate them in amplitude, and output the same.

3. The reader of claim 1, wherein the reception unit comprises:

a carrier demodulation unit removing the carrier signal included in the tag signal;

a multi-subcarrier demodulation unit extracting a tag signal of each subchannel from an output signal from the carrier modulation unit;

a preamble extracting unit extracting a preamble of a valid tag signal from an output signal from the multi-subcarrier demodulation unit; and

a decoding unit decoding an output signal from the preamble extracting unit and transferring the decoded signal to the processor.

4. A tag of a passive RFID system for use with the reader of claim 1, the tag comprising:

a slot selection unit randomly selecting a slot to be used for communicating with a reader;

a subchannel selection unit randomly selecting a subchannel to be used for communicating with the reader;

an amplitude jitter demodulation unit performing an amplitude jitter demodulation on a signal transmitted from the reader;

a tag controller selecting a single slot or subchannel through the slot selection unit and the subchannel selection unit according to the signal demodulated through the amplitude jitter demodulation unit, and determining whether to transmit a tag signal to the reader or whether to enter a sleep state; and

a tag signal generation unit transmitting the tag signal to a subchannel selected by the slot selection unit.

5. The tag of claim 4, wherein the amplitude jitter demodulation unit comprises:

first and second phase delays delaying the phase of the signal transmitted from the reader by 90 degrees and 180 degrees;

first and second reception mixers mixing output signals from the first and second phase delays and a signal transmitted from the reader; and

first and second low pass filters (LPFs) filtering output signals from the first and second reception mixers to extract I and Q channel signals.

6. An operation method of the reader of claim 1, the method comprising:

transmitting a query command when a round starts or is updated to inform a plurality of tags about the number of slots and subchannels constituting the current round;

simultaneously transmitting a slot request command for a current slot and a sleep command by the slots to request a tag signal and, at the same time, entering a tag using a subchannel that does not cause a collision and interference in a previous slot into a sleep state; and

acquiring and analyzing a transmitted tag signal in response to a query command or a slot command by the slots to recognize a subchannel that is not involved in a collision and interference in a current slot, and re-entering the control operation.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the slot command and the sleep command are transmitted in the form of I and Q channel signals which have been amplitude jitter modulated.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the query command comprises a command field in which information indicating that a corresponding command is the query command is stored, a group selection field in which information regarding a tag group is stored, a Q field in which information regarding the number of slots is stored, and an R field in which information regarding the number of subchannels is stored.

9. The method of claim 6, wherein the sleep command comprises a command field in which information indicating that a corresponding command is the sleep command is stored, a slot field in which information regarding whether all the tags which have responded to previous slots are to enter a sleep state or whether only a tag using a subchannel that is not involved in a collision and interference in a previous slot is to enter a sleep state is stored, and a channel sleep field in which information regarding a subchannel that is not involved in a collision and interference is stored.

10. An operation method of a tag with the reader of claim 1, the method comprising:

when a query command is received, analyzing the query command to recognize the number of slots and subchannels constituting a current round, and selecting one slot and one subchannel to be used for communicating with a reader; and

simultaneously receiving a slot request command for a current slot and a sleep command and determining whether to transmit a tag signal to the reader in response to the slot command, or whether to enter a sleep state in response to the sleep command.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the query command comprises a command field in which information indicating that a corresponding command is the query command is stored, a group selection field in which information regarding a tag group is stored, a Q field in which information regarding the number of slots is stored, and an R field in which information regarding the number of subchannels is stored.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the selecting of the single slot or subchannel comprises:

interpreting the group selection field of the sleep command to determine whether to participate in the current round; and

when it is determined to participate in the current round, interpreting the Q field and the R field to recognize the number of slots and subchannels constituting the current round, and selecting one slot and one subchannel to be used for communicating with the reader.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the slot command and the sleep command are transmitted in the form of I and Q channel signals which have been amplitude jitter modulated.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the sleep command comprises a command field in which information indicating that a corresponding command is the sleep command is stored, a slot field in which information regarding whether to enter a sleep state by the slots or by the channels is stored, and a channel sleep field in which information regarding a subchannel that is not involved in a collision and interference is stored.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the determining as to whether to enter the sleep state comprises:

interpreting the slot field of the sleep command to recognize whether to enter the sleep state by the slots or by the channels;

when it is determined to enter the sleep state by the slots, unconditionally entering the sleep state; and

when it is determined to enter the sleep state by the channels, additionally interpreting the channel sleep field to recognize subchannels of tags to enter the sleep state and determine whether to enter the sleep state.