SWIFT: power across wireless networks

Lime Microsystems is currently working in partnership - with Kings College London and the Universities of Lancaster and Leeds - on the recently announced SWIFT project. The project is the first collaborative UK effort to address the theory and practicalities of simultaneously transferring information and power across wireless networks.

Funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the SWIFT project will address issues regarding the modelling, analysis, and design of wireless communication systems.

Wireless systems employ electromagnetic waves to transfer information. Until recently the information transmission capacity of these signals has been the main focus of research and applications. However, thanks to recent advances in silicon technology, the energy requirements of embedded systems have been significantly reduced, making electromagnetic waves a potentially useful source of energy.

Professor Arumugam Nallanathan, from King's College London, said: "This research will bring significant benefits to a range of applications including environmental monitoring, tactical surveillance, intelligent transportation, wireless healthcare, future factories, and smart cities."

Lime will provide RF design kits and flexible RF solutions to the project.

Lime CEO, Ebrahim Bushehri, said, "We are very excited to be involved with the SWIFT project. This is a major step in the development of future networks."