Funded Projects

A battery-powered sensor may send only a few short messages. Even so, radio activity, message length and transmission settings determine the energy they require. INPAKT investigates how long-range communication can use less energy while delivering the information an application needs.

LPWAN technologies such as LoRaWAN, Sigfox, NB-IoT and LTE-M provide the starting point. The project analyses their consumption and energy models and develops modulation methods, protocols and algorithms for energy-efficient sensor networks. This includes investigating how suitable data rates can be chosen predictively.

Evaluation connects energy demand with packet loss, delay and throughput. Fewer joules per message help only when the message arrives in time and remains useful to the application. Longer battery life is the development objective, so message patterns and deployment conditions belong in the assessment.

Battery-powered sensors send short messages to a gateway. Energy per message is an important factor in operating these nodes.

• Analysis of existing LPWAN technologies and their energy consumption models.
• Experimental investigation of energy consumption, reliability, throughput and latency.
• Identification of potential savings and optimisation of data transmission.
  • Investigation of machine learning for predictive ADR mechanisms to anticipate suitable data rates.