TY - JOUR
T1 - Video-Capable Ultrasonic Wireless Communications through Biological Tissues
AU - Tabak, Gizem
AU - Yang, Sijung
AU - Miller, Rita J.
AU - Oelze, Michael L.
AU - Singer, Andrew C.
N1 - Funding Information:
Manuscript received May 2, 2020; accepted August 26, 2020. Date of publication September 1, 2020; date of current version February 24, 2021. This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under Grant R21EB025327. (Corresponding author: Gizem Tabak.) The authors are with the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA, and also with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA (e-mail: tabak2. . .edu).
Publisher Copyright:
© 1986-2012 IEEE.
PY - 2021/3
Y1 - 2021/3
N2 - The use of wireless implanted medical devices (IMDs) is growing because they facilitate monitoring of patients at home and during normal activities, reduce the discomfort of patients, and reduce the likelihood of infection associated with trailing wires. Currently, radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic waves are the most commonly used method for communicating wirelessly with IMDs. However, due to the restrictions on the available bandwidth and the employable power, data rates of RF-based IMDs are limited to 267 kb/s. Considering standard definition video streaming requires data rates of 1.2 Mb/s and high definition requires 3 Mb/s, it is not possible to use the RF electromagnetic communications for high data rate communication applications such as video streaming. In this work, an alternative method that utilizes ultrasonic waves to relay information at high data rates is introduced. An advanced quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) modem with phase-compensating, sparse decision feedback equalizer (DFE) is tailored to realize the full potential of the ultrasonic channel through biological tissues. The proposed system is tested in a variety of scenarios, including both simulations with finite impulse response (FIR) channel models, and real physical transmission experiments with ex vivo beef liver and pork chop samples as well as in situ rabbit abdomen. Consequently, the simulations demonstrated that video-capable data rates can be achieved with millimeter-sized transducers. Real physical experiments confirmed data rates of 6.7, 4.4, 4, and 3.2 Mb/s through water, ex vivo beef liver, ex vivo pork chop, and in situ rabbit abdomen, respectively.
AB - The use of wireless implanted medical devices (IMDs) is growing because they facilitate monitoring of patients at home and during normal activities, reduce the discomfort of patients, and reduce the likelihood of infection associated with trailing wires. Currently, radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic waves are the most commonly used method for communicating wirelessly with IMDs. However, due to the restrictions on the available bandwidth and the employable power, data rates of RF-based IMDs are limited to 267 kb/s. Considering standard definition video streaming requires data rates of 1.2 Mb/s and high definition requires 3 Mb/s, it is not possible to use the RF electromagnetic communications for high data rate communication applications such as video streaming. In this work, an alternative method that utilizes ultrasonic waves to relay information at high data rates is introduced. An advanced quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) modem with phase-compensating, sparse decision feedback equalizer (DFE) is tailored to realize the full potential of the ultrasonic channel through biological tissues. The proposed system is tested in a variety of scenarios, including both simulations with finite impulse response (FIR) channel models, and real physical transmission experiments with ex vivo beef liver and pork chop samples as well as in situ rabbit abdomen. Consequently, the simulations demonstrated that video-capable data rates can be achieved with millimeter-sized transducers. Real physical experiments confirmed data rates of 6.7, 4.4, 4, and 3.2 Mb/s through water, ex vivo beef liver, ex vivo pork chop, and in situ rabbit abdomen, respectively.
KW - Intrabody communications
KW - quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) modulation
KW - video transmission
KW - wireless implanted medical devices (IMDs)
KW - wireless ultrasonic communications
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U2 - 10.1109/TUFFC.2020.3020776
DO - 10.1109/TUFFC.2020.3020776
M3 - Article
C2 - 32870788
AN - SCOPUS:85098370986
SN - 0885-3010
VL - 68
SP - 664
EP - 674
JO - IRE Transactions on Ultrasonic Engineering
JF - IRE Transactions on Ultrasonic Engineering
IS - 3
M1 - 9184127
ER -