Transmission characteristics between in-body and on-body transceivers using mhz-band near-field coupling technology

Abstract

We propose a technology for megahertz-band near field coupling communication using a communication path between a transceiver (TRX) on the surface of the human body (Wearable TRX) and a TRX embedded in the environment (Embedded TRX). We embedded a transceiver (In-body TRX) in a phantom that had the same electrical properties as those of the human body to apply this technology to the healthcare and medical fields. Reducing electrode size and power consumption is a key issue to make small In-body TRXs. We evaluated the quality of transmission by using packet error rate (PER) measurements between the In-body TRX and the Wearable TRX and focused on the dependence of PER on the types of electrodes and output voltages. We present the PER characteristics and describe a basic method of design to reduce the size of the In-body TRX.