Comparison of the RFID-based architectural patterns (italic values signal a limit for this architectural pattern)
\r\n\tIn this book, the different factors of liquefaction, the field methods and laboratory tests to identify a potentially liquefiable soil aim to be reviewed; in addition with history cases (ground behavior during the occurrence of an earthquake, state of stress, deformation, shear strength, flow, etc.).
\r\n\tA very important aspect of this topic is the presentation of the different constructive techniques used to ground improvement (vibrocompaction, dynamic compaction, jet grouting, chemical injection, replacement, etc.), placing special emphasis on those constructive methods used to solve problems on structures already located in areas of low relative density with liquefaction potential, where the installation of monitoring and control equipment is also required (tiltmeters, piezometers, topographic points, seismographs, pressure cells, etc.).
RFID provides a way to connect the real world to the virtual world. An RFID tag can link a physical entity like a location, an object, a plant, an animal, or a human being to its avatar which belongs to a global information system. For instance, let\'s consider the case of an RFID tag attached to a tree. The tree is the physical entity. Its avatar can contain the type of the tree, the size of its trunk, and the list of actions a gardener took on it.
When designing an RFID-based application, a system architect must choose between three locations to store the information: a centralized database, a database locally attached to the device hold by each user of the application, or the tag itself. Each location leads to an RFID-based architectural pattern[1] -. But how to choose the right architectural pattern? What are the application attributes which must be taken into account in order to make the right choice?
The state of the art does not bring satisfactory answers. Indeed, when an article describes a RFID-based architectural pattern, it does not mention the application attributes which lead to choose this architectural pattern. On the other hand, some books or articles present the qualities of architectural patterns. But they do not take into account specificities of RFID. For instance, EPCglobal provides a standardized answer [2]: the centralized architectural pattern. A mobile device, NFC-enabled for example, reads an identifier on the RFID tag, then sends a message to a server which associates the identifier to the avatar stored in a central database. Thanks to its simplicity, this architectural pattern is used by several applications. But, it requires a global computer network: Such requirement increases operational costs. Moreover, it does not withstand an important number of simultaneous RFID read operations. Thus this pattern does not fit all RFID-based applications. [3] presents the stakes of introducing RFIDs inside an enterprise. But it does not contain any system architecture thoughts. In a survey about RFID in pervasive computing, [4] presents several application examples. Depending on the application, avatars are stored either in a central database or in the tags themselves. But the authors do not give any clues on why an application has chosen to store its avatars in a given location. On the other hand, [1] lists the attributes which must be accommodated in a system architecture. Above all, there are the functionalities which are required from the system. Then, orthogonal to these functionality attributes, there are quality attributes. The authors distinguish system quality attributes (availability, modifiability, performance, scalability, security, testability, and usability), business qualities (time to market, cost and benefits, and projected lifetime), and qualities about the architecture itself (e.g. conceptual integrity). But the authors do not focus on RFID specific features.
So we have analyzed several existing industrial or experimental RFID-based applications. Moreover, we have developed RFID-based applications. From this experience, we identify the relevant attributes to compare RFID-based architectural patterns. We present them in section 2. With these identified attributes and their different aspects, we analyze four RFID-based architectural patterns, used by applications to access the avatar of a tagged entity. In the centralized architectural pattern, the mobile device reads an identifier on the RFID tag; then it contacts a server which associates this identifier to the avatar stored in a central database or in a database distributed between several companies [2]. With the semi-distributed architectural pattern, each mobile device holds a local copy of a central database associating RFID identifiers to avatars [5]. In the distributed architectural pattern, each RFID tag holds the avatar [6]. With the RFID-based Distributed Shared Memory, RFID tags hold the avatar and a replica of the avatar of other tags [7]. Sections 3 to 6 detail all of these architectural patterns: they present application examples and analyze the architectural pattern with the attributes identified in section 2. Thanks to this analysis, in section 7, we are able to provide guidelines to choose the convenient RFID-based architectural pattern. Finally, section 8 concludes this chapter and proposes perspectives for this work.
Relying on the experience gained by analyzing existing RFID-based applications and by developing RFID-based applications, we outline three architecture attributes among the attributes presented in [1]: (i) functionality, (ii) scalability, and (iii) cost. For each attribute, we present its different aspects which are influenced by the use of RFID technology.
Functionality is the ability of the system to do the work for which it was intended.
All architectural patterns give the ability to read/write the avatar of a read tag.
A first aspect of the functionality attribute is to check how the application behaves when it queries the avatar of a read tag. Is it guaranteed that the returned avatar has indeed the value which was last written? In other words, is there a staleness issue of avatar of a read tag?
The second aspect concerns the possibility of knowing the value (or having an order of idea of the value) of the avatar of a remote tag. By “remote”, we mean that the user is not physically near the tag: The user is not able to put her reader on the tag. All she has is the identifier of the remote tag.
The third aspect is the staleness issue of the avatar of a remote tag. If the user is able to know the avatar of a remote tag, is it guaranteed that the returned avatar has indeed the last values associated to the tag?
The scalability criteria category evaluates how each architectural pattern behaves when there are numerous tags or numerous readers.
Its first aspect is the maximum number of tags which can be handled by the architectural pattern.
The second aspect characterizes the sensitivity of the architectural pattern to the number of simultaneous RFID tag read operations.
The cost attribute groups all of the aspects which have an influence on the installation costs or the operational costs of the RFID-based application.
The first cost aspect concerns the requirement for a global network: do RFID readers have to be able to access at any time and any place to a specific computing machine (for instance, a server in the case of the centralized architectural pattern)? To fulfill this requirement, the readers may be equipped with a wired connection. In that case, the mobility of the readers is limited. The readers may also rely on Bluetooth® or Wi-Fi gateways. Both of these gateways may introduce installation costs. Moreover some readers may not be Wi-Fi enabled. For instance, the Nokia 6212 mobile phone is NFC-enabled, but has no Wi-Fi capabilities. Finally the reader may rely on a mobile data connection (e.g. UMTS, HSDPA, etc.). Such solution introduces operational costs because of data plans.
The second cost aspect concerns the RAM requirement on each tag. The more RAM there is on the tag, the more expensive the tag is. Notice that RAM may actually be prohibited on tags for technical reasons and not for cost reasons. For instance, application may require the use of low-frequency tags (e.g. 125 kHz), so that readers can interact with tags even though there is a liquid between tags and readers. In this case, the throughput is too low for a tag to host information other than its identifier.
The third cost aspect concerns the introduction of a new tag in the environment. For each architectural pattern, we determine the sequence of operations which is required in order to introduce a new tag in the environment. Knowing this sequence, we can determine how long this sequence lasts. Because this initialization procedure is executed by a human or a robot operator, its cost is proportional to the time spent.
The final cost aspect is related to the reinitialization of all of the tags. This criterion concerns only applications which, during their lifetime, need sometimes to have each tag given a new initial value. For instance, this is the case of Paris public transportation system. Users are equipped with a transportation pass containing an RFID tag. At the beginning of a month, each user has to reload her pass (to refresh her access rights): in other words, the tag has to be reinitialized. Some RFID-based games also require tag reinitialization. Indeed, in the case of non-permanent games, users play during successive game sessions. Thus at the beginning of each session, all of the tags must be reinitialized.
In this section, we have defined different aspects of three architecture attributes: (i) functionality, (ii) scalability, and (iii) cost. These aspects are influenced by the use of RFID technology. We use them to compare the behavior of four RFID-based architectural patterns. We start by analyzing centralized architectural pattern.
This architectural pattern is often used by manufacturing applications. It has been standardized by EPCglobal [2]. When a reader is near a tag (for instance, the blue mobile in Figure 1), it reads the tag’s identifier or an identifier stored in the tag’s data zone (its Electronic Product Code in the case of EPCglobal). This identifier is represented by the hexagon in Figure 1. Then, the reader asks a server (ONS lookup service in the case of EPCglobal) which machine (EPC Manager in the case of EPCglobal) manages the avatar corresponding to the read identifier. When the server responds, the reader contacts this machine with the identifier of the tag. The machine queries its database and returns the avatar (for instance, the contents of the hexagon in the database in Figure 1).
Centralized architectural pattern
Next section gives examples of this architectural pattern.
Aspire RFID is an Open Source middleware which is compliant to the specifications of EPCglobal [8]. It proposes several examples of industrial applications for tracking goods.
Next paragraphs present products or prototypes developed according to centralized architectural pattern, but without being compliant to EPCglobal.
PAC-LAN is a game prototype in which players are equipped with NFC mobile phones without any GPS capabilities [9]. Players must interact with NFC tags which have been disseminated throughout a neighborhood. In a central database, the identifier of each tag is associated to geographical coordinates. When a player reads a tag, her mobile phone uses the UMTS network to contact the server with the tag’s identifier. The server queries its database, finds the geographical coordinates, and broadcasts them to all of the players. An administrative application is provided to reset a game on the server. Such reset has an impact on all of the players’ mobile phones.
[10] proposes an application so that visitors of an art exhibition can discover the paintings in another way. NFC tags are dispatched on the back of exposed paintings. Equipped with an NFC-enabled phone, the visitor puts her phone on spots of the paintings which intrigue her. Phone reads the identifier stored in the tag. Then, it contacts an uGASP server [11-12]. After consulting an internal database, this server indicates to the mobile phone what must be done: display a text, an image, or play an audio comment. Thus the author of the painting is able to communicate with the visitor.
Via Mineralia is a pervasive serious game which goal is to enrich the visit of a Freiberg museum [13]. In this game, the visitor uses a PDA equipped with an RFID reader. RFID tags (holding a unique identifier) are dispatched in the showcases which the museum wants to emphasize. When the PDA scans a tag, it sends an HTTP request (with tag’s identifier) to a web server. To do so, the PDA uses a Wi-Fi network which covers the whole museum. The server answers to the PDA with multimedia information. The PDA displays them in a navigator.
Touchatag company (formerly Tikitag) sells NFC readers which can be connected to Windows or Mac-OS personal computers, and NFC tags dedicated to Touchatag [14]. A customer can then connect to http://www.touchatag.com web site, and define the reaction to be associated to the reading of one tag. When the NFC reader reads a tag, it contacts the Touchatag application which runs permanently on customer’s personal computer. Then, via the Internet network to which the computer is connected, this application contacts a Touchatag service called Application Correlation Service (ACS). Touchatag application gives tag’s identifier to ACS. Then, ACS queries Touchatag database to find reaction associated to the reading of this tag. It sends back this information to Touchatag application. The touchatag application reacts in the appropriate way. For instance, let’s assume that the customer has specified the following action on Touchatag web site: when tag r with identifier i is put on the reader, customer wants her browser to access to Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of a web site w. Then, when customer puts tag r on the reader, Touchatag application contacts ACS with identifier i. ACS replies with URL of w. Then, Touchatag application opens a browser with this URL w.
Skylanders is a video game developed by Activision company [15]. It requires the use of plastic figures. These figures contain an NFC tag. When a player puts her figure on top of a “Portal of Power” (actually, an NFC tag reader), the video game reads the identifier stored in the NFC tag. Then, the game contacts a server to get the information concerning the character which must be displayed: The figure becomes alive on the screen. Notice that, according to [16], information is also stored inside the tag: Thus the game can work without using a global network to contact a server. This means that Skylanders not only uses a centralized architectural pattern, but also a distributed one.
Based on all of these examples, next section analyzes centralized architectural pattern.
Concerning the functional attribute, any transponder which wants to modify the avatar of a tag does so by sending a modification message to the server. Thus the server is always aware of the last update done on any avatar. As a reader always queries the central database to know the avatar of a tag, it is not possible that the read value is stale. Moreover, knowing a tag identifier, a reader is able to query the server to know the avatar associated to this identifier: the reader is able to know the avatar of a remote tag. As a mobile device queries the server to know the avatar of a remote tag, it is sure that the returned value is not stale.
Concerning the scalability attribute, the maximum number of tags which can be handled by this architectural pattern is limited by the number of avatars which can be stored in the central database. Let s be the average size in bytes of an avatar. Let Scentral be the maximum size in bytes of the database. We neglect the storage of the link between tag identifiers and avatars in the database. Moreover, we neglect the overhead due to the storage of data in the database. Then, the maximum number of tags is bounded by Scentral/s. About sensitivity to the number of simultaneous reads, this architectural pattern is restrained by its centralized nature. The server holding the ONS lookup service may become a bottleneck. Moreover, the different servers of avatars may not return avatar values fast enough. Of course, it is possible to increase the number of servers. But that makes the hardware architecture more complex and more costly (from an installation and a management point of view). Thus this architectural pattern may not be applicable for some applications.
Concerning the cost attribute, the reader must always be in contact with the server holding the ONS lookup service and the servers of avatars: a global network is required. On the other hand, this architectural pattern only needs to read an identifier on the tag. And this identifier can be stored in ROM as it is never modified: no RAM is required on the tags. When a new tag is introduced in the system, three operations are required: (i) the tag is linked to the physical entity; (ii) the avatar of this entity is initialized in the central database; and (iii) a link between the tag identifier and this avatar is created into the central database. When all of the tags have to be reinitialized, a program is run on the server hosting the central database. It sets each avatar to its new value.
This section has analyzed centralized architectural pattern according to the attributes presented in section 2. This architectural pattern fulfills all aspects of functionality attribute. But this is achieved with the operational cost of a global network. Another disadvantage is a high sensitivity to the number of simultaneous read operations.
Next section analyzes semi-distributed architectural pattern which compensates the requirement for a global computer network and reduces sensitivity to the number of simultaneous reads.
In semi-distributed architectural pattern, mobile RFID-enabled devices (PDAs, mobile phones, etc.) are periodically synchronized with a central database holding all of the avatars (see Figure 2). Then, human operators carry the mobile devices near the entities to which the tags are associated. When a device comes close to an entity, the device reads the identifier of the entity’s tag. By querying its local copy of the central database, the device is able to find the avatar of this entity. Any modification of an avatar is done on the local copy. It is propagated to the central database at the next synchronization.
Semi-distributed architectural pattern
Next section presents an example of this architectural pattern.
The unique example of use of such architectural pattern is Paris trees management application [5]. Each of the ninety-five thousand trees of Paris avenues is equipped with an RFID tag. Each gardener synchronizes her tablet PC with the central database before a new day of work. During her day of work, whenever a gardener does something to a tree, she identifies the tree thanks to its RFID tag: Her tablet PC modifies the avatar in the local database. Then, in the evening, she synchronizes her tablet PC with the central database. Thus she uploads her database updates and downloads updates from other gardeners.
Now, let’s analyze the semi-distributed architectural pattern.
Concerning the functional attribute, the avatar of a read tag may be stale. Suppose users U1 and U2 synchronize their mobile device with the central database. Then U1 modifies avatar of tag r. Thus she modifies her local copy of the database. When U2 comes to tag r, as her device reads its local copy of the database, the returned value of the avatar is the value before U1’s modification: the read value is stale. Notice we can limit this issue by assigning sets of entities to each mobile device. For instance, in the case of the Paris trees management application, a supervisor can assign a set of trees to be taken care of during the day, to each of the gardeners. If all of these sets are apart, this issue cannot be observed anymore. About remote tags, by querying its local database, the device is able to read the avatar of a remote tag, even though there is no global network. But the read value can be stale. It will be again correct only when all of the mobile devices have synchronized themselves with the central database.
Concerning the scalability attribute, the maximum number of tags which can be handled by this architectural pattern is limited by the number of avatars which can be stored in the central database and in the local copy of this database. Let Slocal be the maximum size in bytes of the local database. The maximum number of tags is bounded by min(Scentral/s,Slocal/s), which is likely to be Slocal/s as mobile devices do not have as much memory as servers. Notice that this bound can be increased to Scentral/s by assigning to each mobile only a subset of the central database. For instance, in the case of Paris trees management application, the mobile device of a gardener could receive only the avatars of the trees she will take care of during the day. About sensitivity to the number of simultaneous reads, this architectural pattern is not as sensitive as centralized architectural pattern. It does not need to query a server upon each RFID tag read. Nevertheless all of the readers must periodically synchronize themselves with the central database. As the synchronization time is proportional to the number of readers, it may reach unbearable values. This issue can be tackled by limiting the number of avatars copied on the local devices, thus reducing the volume of data transferred between each device and the central database.
Concerning the cost attribute, the mobile RFID-enabled devices only need an access to the server hosting the central database during synchronization phase. At that moment, devices are probably near the central database: A Wi-Fi network may be used. Otherwise it is the local database which is queried. Thus no global communication network is required around the working area. Moreover, as in centralized architectural pattern, there is no need for RAM on the tags. When a new tag is inserted in the system, the procedure to be applied is the same as in the centralized architectural pattern. When all of the tags have to be reinitialized, a program is run on the server hosting the central database. It sets each avatar to its new value. However, the reinitialization of the tags will be effective only when all mobile devices will get synchronized with the central database.
This section has analyzed semi-distributed architectural pattern according to the attributes presented in section 2. This architectural pattern does not require any global network and has a medium sensitivity to the number of simultaneous tag reads. Nevertheless it faces a functional issue concerning the staleness of avatar read on a local (or remote) tag.
Next section analyzes the distributed architectural pattern which tackles the sensitivity and staleness issues.
In distributed architectural pattern, the avatar of an RFID tag is stored inside the RAM of the tag (see Figure 3). Whenever a user is in contact with a tag, the reader works with the part of the RAM containing the avatar.
Distributed architectural pattern
Next section gives examples of this architectural pattern.
Nokia 6131 NFC phones are sold with three NFC tags. Each one triggers a different function on the telephone: One activates alarm function; another one plays a given music on the phone; the last one displays an NFC tutorial. To do so, the telephone reads the contents of the tag, this contents being coded as a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) according to the NFC Forum’s specifications of Smarts Posters [5,17-18]. When the phone is programmed to understand tags’ contents formatted according to these specifications, these URIs can be used to tell the telephone to accomplish a given function like send an SMS, call a certain number, open a given web page, etc.
In fact, it is thanks to this Smart Posters specification that any NFC phone can exploit Touchatag tags mentioned in section 3.1. Indeed, these tags contain not only an identifier used by Touchatag application, but also an URI. This URI is the URL of a Touchatag web server with a parameter containing the identifier of the tag. Thus when a user touches a Touchatag tag with her mobile phone, the phone reads the URL and then opens a browser with this URL. Touchatag web server is then contacted, via 3G or Wi-Fi, with the identifier i. Then, web server contacts ACS (see section 3.1) with i. In the case where i is associated with a web site w, URL of w is sent back to Touchatag web server. This server returns an html page containing a redirection towards w. Finally, the browser displays w. Notice that, in the case of a Touchatag tag read by a mobile phone, phone uses distributed architectural pattern to determine the Touchatag web server to contact; but, the Touchatag web server uses centralized architectural pattern to translate the tag identifier into an action.
Once again, it is the Smart Posters specification which is used by Connecthing company to bring intelligence to mailboxes [19]. When a user scans a mailbox equipped with an NFC tag, her phone reads the URL stored on the tag (which contains an identifier corresponding to the physical location of the mailbox) and opens a browser to access this URL. This web page displays location of nearby mailboxes, the time at which postman takes the mail, etc.
Navigo, the Paris public transportation pass, is an example of an industrial application based on this architectural pattern, which does not use Smart Posters specification [20]. The 4.5 million Navigo pass users do not have an NFC reader. They are only given a pass which contains an NFC tag. With a vending machine, each user initializes her tag with the rights she buys to use the public transportation. Whenever she wants to use a public transportation, she presents her pass in front of an NFC reader. Locally, the reader checks the rights stored in the tag’s RAM and opens the gate, if the access is granted.
Ubi-Check is an academic application example of distributed architectural pattern [21]. An RFID tag is attached to each of a traveler’s items. At the beginning of their travel, each tag is initialized with a value specific to the traveler. All of these RFID tags are read after special points (e.g. after an airport security control). If an inconsistency is found among the read values, it means that, at some point, the traveler exchanged one of her items with the item of another traveler. An alarm is thus triggered to warn the traveler that one of her items is missing.
[22] proposes an academic system based on digital pheromones to find objects lost in a house. To do so, floor of the house is covered with RFID tags. An RFID reader is coupled with each house object. When user moves an object from point A to point B, the RFID reader associated with the object behaves like an ant which sets pheromones on the path it takes: The reader writes a digital pheromone (made of object identifier and timestamp of transit) in the RAM of each tag over which it goes. Notice that, like a natural pheromone which evaporates with time, whenever a reader finds no more room in the RAM of a tag (there are too many pheromones stored inside), the reader deletes the oldest pheromone from the tag. In case an object is lost, user takes a dedicated RFID reader and wanders around the house until she finds the digital pheromones of the object. Once she has located it, she follows the pheromone trace until the place where the object was left.
Roboswarn is an (academic) application to position robots (equipped with NFC readers) in a physical space to accomplish a certain task [23]. NFC tags are dispatched in dedicated places of a room (for instance, near a hospital bed which these robots will have to push so that a cleaning robot can accomplish its task). Each tag is initialized with location of other tags in the room and the timestamp of last cleaning. When robots enter the room, they look for an NFC tag. As soon as one robot finds one, it reads the position of other tags and transmits them to other robots. The other robots go to the other tags. If timestamp of last cleaning is too old, robots push the hospital bed and then write new timestamp of cleaning. Otherwise, robots do nothing.
SALTO Systems company is selling locks for electronic doors. The keys are NFC tags. To facilitate the management of all locks and tags, this company has developed SALTO Virtual Network (SVN) [24]. Thanks to this system, Heathrow airport operator is able to manage 1000 standard electronic locks (NFC-controlled) and 37 hot spots. These spots are special locks connected to a global computer network. They can: 1) unlock an entry access on the whole site, 2) initialize an NFC key with the right to open given locks during the day, 3) blacklist some NFC keys, 4) recover data collected by the key during the working day of its user. Indeed, each time a person unlocks an electronic lock with her NFC key, the lock reads data stored on tag to check user permissions and the list of blacklisted tags. But, the electronic lock also writes information like, for instance, the low charge of the battery powering the lock. Thus thanks to SVN, even though standard locks do not have access to a global computer network, they can receive information (e.g. list of blacklisted cards) and send information (e.g. low charge of battery): Standard locks communicate thanks to the network made of the users of the keys/tags.
Based on all of these examples, next section analyzes distributed architectural pattern.
Concerning the functional attribute, as the avatar is written and read only in the RAM of the tag, there is no staleness issue of locally read tags. However, it is impossible to know the avatar of a remote tag.
Concerning the scalability attribute, there is no limit on the number of tags in the application environment. Moreover, such distributed architectural pattern is not sensitive at all to the number of simultaneous read operations (all of the operations are done locally).
Concerning the cost attribute, the reader does not need any global network to access to the avatar of the RFID tag. On the other hand, RAM is required on each tag. Its size must be at least the size of the avatar. This means that the avatar cannot contain too much information (e.g. MIFARE tags can offer up to 4 Kbytes of RAM, with 3440 bytes of net storage capacity). When a new tag is introduced in the system, only two operations are required: (i) the tag is linked to the physical entity; and (ii) the avatar of this entity is initialized in the RAM. About the reinitialization of the tags, it is application-dependant. Some applications require that a dedicated user goes through all of the tags to reinitialize them. In the case of Navigo pass, users are in charge of bringing their pass to a vending machine. This leads to long waiting lines at the beginning of a month, when users must initialize their rights for this month. This is why Navigo operator carries out experiments where users can initialize their tag using a dedicated NFC reader connected to their personal computer. To avoid reinitialization costs, some RFID-based distributed applications put in place special mechanisms. These mechanisms take into account elapsed time in order to automatically reset data. In Roboswarm application (see section 5.1), there is no need to reset the timestamp to trigger a new cleaning of a room. Each robot is aware of a deterioration level. Thus if the timestamp plus this deterioration level is greater than current time, it means that the room needs some cleaning again. With application for pheromone-based object tracking (see section 5.1), although tags have limited RAM capabilities, there is still no need to have a periodic session initialization which would clean up outdated pheromones. Each pheromone is written on a tag with a timestamp. Thus when the device attached to the roaming object meets a tag, it cleans up pheromones which have a too old timestamp, before writing the dedicated pheromone.
This section has analyzed distributed architectural pattern according to the attributes presented in section 2. This architectural pattern does not require any global computer network. And it is not sensitive to the number of simultaneous read operations. Nevertheless it faces a functional issue: it is not possible to get the avatar of a remote tag.
Next section analyzes RFID-based DSM which tackles this issue.
RFID-based distributed shared memory (RFID-based DSM) mixes the qualities of semi-distributed architectural pattern and distributed architectural pattern [7]. The avatar of an RFID tag is stored in the RAM of the tag. In addition, each tag and each mobile device of the application environment holds a local copy of all of the avatars (see Figure 4). Moreover they hold a vector clock (see Figure 5). Each element of this vector clock is a number corresponding to the last version of the avatar which the tag or the device has learnt about (this is why [25] gives the name version number to this number). When a mobile device comes to a tag and modifies the avatar of the tag, this mobile increments the element of the vector clock (stored on the tag and inside its own memory) corresponding to the avatar of this tag. Whenever a mobile device meets a tag (respectively another device), the device and the tag (respectively the other device) compare their respective view of the avatars, by comparing their vector clocks values. Doing so, each of them learns from the other one the latest news (which they are aware of) about all of the avatars.
RFID-based distributed shared memory architectural pattern
Data of RFID-based distributed shared memory
Next section presents an example of this architectural pattern.
Plug: Secrets of the museum, an (academic) pervasive game [26] developed in the context of the PLUG research project [27], is the unique example of use of RFID-based DSM architectural pattern. In this game, 48 virtual playing cards represent objects of French Museum of Arts and Crafts (Musée des arts et métiers). These cards are dealt between 16 NFC tags (1 card per MIFARE tag, each of them being equipped with 1 KB of RAM) and 8 mobile phones (4 cards per Nokia 6131 NFC mobile). The players’ goal is to collect cards of the same family on her mobile. To do so, players use their mobile to swap a card with a tag or another mobile.
Next section analyzes RFID-based DSM architectural pattern.
Concerning the functional attribute, whenever a mobile device comes near a tag, there are two possibilities. Either the tag has been already initialized; in that case, as the avatar is stored on the tag, the value read on the tag is the most up-to-date. Or, the tag has not been already initialized; in that case, the first task of the mobile device is to initialize the tag; so that the value read on the tag after this initialization is also the most up-to-date value. Thus there is no staleness issue for avatar of locally read tag. Moreover, a mobile device holds a local copy of all avatars. Thus by querying this local copy, the device is able to answer to queries concerning a remote tag. However this local copy may not be up-to-date: There is a staleness issue for avatar of remotely read tag.
Concerning the scalability attribute, the maximum number of tags is limited by the size of the RAM of the tags. This architectural pattern stores copies of the avatar of all of tags and a vector clock. Let Stag be the lowest size of the RAM of the tags present in the environment. Let L be the length of an element of the vector clock. Then the maximum number of tags is bounded by Stag/(s + L). Let’s compare this bound to the bound of semi-distributed architectural pattern. For the latter pattern, the numerator is expressed in terms of Gigabytes. However it is expressed in terms of Kilobytes in the case of a tag’s RAM. The maximum number of tags for RFID-based DSM architectural pattern is at least one million times lower than the maximum number for semi-distributed architectural pattern. About sensitivity to the number of simultaneous reads, RFID-based DSM requires that all mobile devices synchronize with a dedicated machine: RFID-based DSM is as sensitive as semi-distributed architectural pattern.
Concerning the cost attribute, in RFID-based DSM architectural pattern, the reader does not need any global network to access to the avatar of the RFID tag. Nevertheless RAM is required on each tag. Its size must be at least the size of the avatar times the number of tags in the environment (so that a tag can hold a local copy of all avatars). This means that the avatar can contain even less information than in the case of distributed architectural pattern.
When a new tag is introduced in the system, four operations are required: (i) the tag is linked to the physical entity; (ii) the avatar of this entity is created and initialized in DBinit, the database used to (re)initialize the local copy on each mobile (DBinit is stored on a dedicated machine which can be one of the mobiles); (iii) a link between the tag identifier and this avatar is created in DBinit; and (iv) all of the elements of the tag’s vector clock are initialized to zero.
When tags must be reinitialized, a program Pinit is executed on the machine hosting DBinit. This program computes the initial value VCinit of the vector clock for this session, so that each element of VCinit is greater, thus more recent, than all the vector clock elements in the mobiles. To do so, Pinit can use two methods. The first method is twofold: (i) get the vector clocks of all of the mobiles; and (ii) compute the maximum value. This first method does not require additional memory on each tag, but requires additional communication between the mobiles and the dedicated machine. This method works because the vector clock of a tag evolves only when a tag is in contact of a mobile. Thus there is always at least one mobile device which is aware of the values stored in the vector clock of a tag: Pinit does not need to be aware of the vector clock values stored on the tags. The second method supposes that each vector clock element is made of two fields: a “session identifier” field and a “tick in this session” field. Thus Pinit has only to increase the session number and set all “tick in this session” fields to zero. This second method requires additional memory on each tag, but no additional communication between the mobiles and the machine running Pinit. The choice of the method is application dependant. Once one of the two methods has been applied, the dedicated machine synchronizes each mobile device by sending the contents of DBinit and VCinit to the device. Afterwards, whenever a mobile device is in contact with an uninitialized RFID tag for this session, as the mobile device vector clock is greater than the tag vector clock, the mobile device initializes the tag. In other words, RFID-based DSM architectural pattern takes advantage of the fact that application users will go to tags, to initialize them: This pattern uses the communication network made by application users, instead of using a global computer network.
This section has analyzed RFID-based DSM architectural pattern according to the attributes presented in section 2. This architectural pattern does not require any global computer network. And it does not experience the issue of staleness of an avatar of a read tag. Moreover it is possible to query the avatar of a remote tag. Nevertheless this architectural pattern experiences staleness issues when accessing to avatar of a remote tag. And there is a scalability issue in terms of maximum number of tags which can be handled.
By synthesizing the conclusions observed for the different architectural patterns, the next section provides guidelines for choosing the most adequate pattern for a given application.
Table 1 synthesizes the analysis of the different aspects of the architecture attributes made on all of the architectural patterns. In this table, values which are in italic correspond to aspects which are a limitation for this architectural pattern.
If the application requires the best level for all aspects of functionality attribute, then the centralized architectural pattern must be chosen. It is the only architectural pattern which experiences no issues within the functionality attribute. But this pattern has an operational cost due to the requirement for a global network. And this pattern is highly sensitive to the number of simultaneous reads.
\n\t\t\t | Central. | \n\t\t\tSemi-distr. | \n\t\t\tDistributed | \n\t\t\tRDSM | \n\t\t
Staleness of locally read tag | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t
Avatar of remote tag | \n\t\t\tYes | \n\t\t\tYes | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tNo\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tYes | \n\t\t
Staleness of remote read tag | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tn.a. | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t
Maximum number of tags | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tScentral/s\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tSlocal/s\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tInfinite | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tStag/(s+L)\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t
Sensitivity to number of simultaneous reads | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tHigh\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tMedium | \n\t\t\tNone | \n\t\t\tMedium | \n\t\t
Network required | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t
RAM required on tag | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\tNo | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tYes\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t
Cost of introducing a tag (most costly operation) | \n\t\t\tLink tag to physical entity | \n\t\t\tLink tag to physical entity | \n\t\t\tLink tag to physical entity | \n\t\t\tLink tag to physical entity | \n\t\t
Cost of reinit. Tags (most costly operation) | \n\t\t\tReinit. Database | \n\t\t\tSync. Database | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\tGo to all tags\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\tSync. database | \n\t\t
Comparison of the RFID-based architectural patterns (italic values signal a limit for this architectural pattern)
If one of these last two issues is a problem, the system architect must consider the three other architectural patterns. Semi-distributed architectural pattern must be chosen if RFID tags cannot host RAM. This constraint may be due to cost motivations, but also technical constraints (use of low-frequency tags, see section 2).
If there can be RAM on tags, the maximum number of tags must be determined. If it is compatible with RFID-based DSM architectural pattern limitations, then this pattern should be chosen (as it is the least limited pattern for the functionality attribute). Otherwise the system architect should choose distributed architectural pattern (if there must be no staleness issue for read tags) or semi-distributed architectural pattern (if the cost of reinitializing tags is an important factor). Notice that the mixing of distributed architectural pattern and RFID-based DSM may be an interesting alternative. On each tag, we can store its avatar and the vector clock element corresponding to this avatar. Each mobile device holds a copy of all avatars and a full vector clock. By applying RFID-based DSM procedures, we get a solution for the limited maximum number of tags in RFID-based DSM. And in the same time, we solve distributed architectural pattern limitations (as we can query avatar of remote tags and we reduce the high cost of tag reinitialization).
To illustrate the use of these guidelines, let’s consider the choice of the architectural pattern for the RFID-based game Plug: Secrets of the museum presented in section 6.1.
Each tag costs about 0.10 euro (respectively 1.50 euro) if it has 0 KB (respectively 1 KB with 752 bytes of net storage capacity, Stag=752 bytes) of RAM. The avatar of a tag is the virtual card “contained” in the tag. There is a maximum of 16 cards in the game. Thus the avatar is coded as a byte value (s=1 byte). Concerning the vector clock, the project uses the synchronization method requiring a session identifier. To have an ever-increasing value, “session identifier” field stores the initialization time. This time is the difference, measured in milliseconds, between the session initialization time and midnight, January 1st, 1970 UTC. This storage requires 8 bytes per tag. Moreover, each tag holds the “tick in this session” field of each avatar stored in the tag.
This field is coded as a short (L=2 bytes). It represents a real-time clock, formatted as the number of seconds since the beginning of the game session (A session lasts less than 2 hours: there is no risk of overflow). This clock is the time known by the tag of the last update of the avatar of another tag. It takes about 20 minutes to attach each of the 16 tags to their correct location, so an average of 75 seconds per tag. Linking the tag and the avatar takes about 5 seconds per tag. Initializing the avatar is done in a few milliseconds by an initialization program. For reinitializing tags, synchronizing all of the 8 mobiles with a dedicated machine takes about 1 minute, that is an average of 4 seconds per tag. Notice that synchronization is based on NFC peer-to-peer communication. The project could have saved synchronization time if it has used Bluetooth®, but it would have used more battery.
If the project is going to use centralized or semi-centralized architectural pattern, it will use a dedicated machine for hosting the central database. This machine will be equipped with a 500 gigabytes disk (Scentral=500 GB). In the case of the semi-distributed architectural pattern, the project will use half of the micro-SD memory of each mobile phone to host the local copy of the database (Slocal=1 GB). If the project is going to use centralized architectural pattern, each mobile will have to be equipped with a SIM card giving access to a UMTS data plan. This will cost 15 euros per mobile per month. If the project is going to use distributed architectural pattern, it will take 13 minutes to go by all of the 16 tags to reinitialize them, so an average of 49 seconds per tag.
We apply these numeric values to table 1. Table 2 synthesizes the results. In this table, values which are in italic correspond to criteria which are a limitation for this architectural pattern.
Centralized architectural pattern requires a global network which costs 120 euros per month. The museum which hosts the game considers it is too expensive. We have to turn to one of the other architectural patterns. As the game must manage 16 tags and as the RFID-based DSM can handle a maximum of 248 tags (as s=1 byte), we can choose this architectural pattern. However, if s had been 250 bytes, this pattern could have handled only 4 tags: It would not have fitted. As there must be no issue about avatar of read tags (the game would not be fun), we would have chosen distributed architectural pattern (or combination of distributed and RFID-based DSM patterns, in order to reduce the costs of reinitializing tags).
This chapter studies four RFID-based architectural patterns: centralized, semi-distributed, distributed and RFID-based DSM. It compares them according to nine aspects of three architecture attributes: functionality, scalability and cost. Despite their specific limitations, each architectural pattern fits the requirements of existing applications.
\n\t\t\t | Central. | \n\t\t\tSemi-distr. | \n\t\t\tDistributed | \n\t\t\tRDSM | \n\t\t
Maximum number of tags if s=1 byte (s=250 bytes) | \n\t\t\t500 x 109 (2 x 109) | \n\t\t\t109 (4 x 106) | \n\t\t\tInfinite (Infinite) | \n\t\t\t248 (2) | \n\t\t
Cost of computer network (per month) | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t120 euros\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\t0 euro | \n\t\t\t0 euro | \n\t\t\t0 euro | \n\t\t
Cost of tag (per tag) | \n\t\t\t0.10 euro | \n\t\t\t0.10 euro | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t1.50 euro\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t1.50 euro\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t
Cost of introducing a tag (in seconds per tag) | \n\t\t\t80 s/tag | \n\t\t\t80 s/tag | \n\t\t\t80 s/tag | \n\t\t\t80 s/tag | \n\t\t
Cost of reinitializing tags (in seconds per tag) | \n\t\t\t0 s/tag | \n\t\t\t4 s/tag | \n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t49 s/tag\n\t\t\t | \n\t\t\t4 s/tag | \n\t\t
Comparison of the RFID-based architectural patterns in the case of the game Plug: Secrets of the Museum (italic values signal a limit for this architectural pattern)
The chapter proposes guidelines for choosing the RFID-based architectural pattern which will best fit a given application requirements. These guidelines are tested in the context of an RFID-based pervasive game.
Future work concerns the analysis of these architectural patterns with respect to security architecture attribute. Security is a measure of the system’s ability to resist unauthorized usage while still providing its services to legitimate users [1]. This future work will determine the influence which the level of resistance to security attacks and the cost of implementing such resistance have on the guidelines provided in this paper. Another attribute we would like to study is the fault-tolerance of the different elements of the system.
Pertaining to the day-to-day energy usage increases, various technologies were addressed to satisfy the current energy demand. Based on this circumstance, the electronic devices for energy conversion (solar cells and fuel cells) and energy storage (batteries and supercapacitors) were extensively studied throughout the world [1]. Basically, the performance of these devices depends on the materials’ design with different nanostructures and material interfaces. In particular, advanced materials including carbon nanomaterials, viz., carbon black, carbon nanotubes, carbon nanofibers, graphene, and so on, play a vital role in an attempt to lead the breakthrough and challenges from laboratory scale to technology ideas [2].
Among them, graphene, since its discovery, has been stirring enthusiasm among the scientific community owing to its attractive properties. Properties such as high electrocatalytic activity, good conductivity with immense surface area, and low costs make it an ideal candidate to implement in electrochemical application. Subsequently, graphene has been utilized as a promising candidate in energy storage applications such as battery and supercapacitors (SCs) [3, 4]. Due to its high electrical conductivity, charge carrier mobility, and transparency, it has been potentially used as an electrode for electrochemical energy device application [5, 6]. Processing of graphene electrodes differs according to their application by fabrication techniques and synthetic strategies. As graphene is an electrode focusing on rechargeable battery application, the device performance is based on the presence of electroactive sites in graphene sheets [7, 8]. Therefore, graphene sheets composited with suitable electroactive materials like metal chalcogenides, metal oxides/hydroxides, metal nanostructures, and even the heteroatom-doped graphene provide better activity for rechargeable batteries [9, 10, 11]. Conventionally, the electrode materials were deposited on metal foils by doctor-blade technique, drop-casting, spray-coating, or spin coating to construct the batteries. This electrode material was mixed with foreign materials (binders and conducting agent) to make into ink, paste, colloidal dispersion, etc., for deposition purposes. In the case of self-supported graphene foams or FSGs, the foreign materials are avoided, and on the whole, they act as electrodes directly [12]. This chapter outlines few reported literature on FSG performance for rechargeable battery applications. Moreover, we summarized the synthetic strategies and fabrication of free-standing graphene/hybrid functional materials for particular device application.
Graphene is a 2D one atom thin sheet that consists of hexagonal sp2 carbon, which is densely packed into honey-comb lattice and large benzene-like aromatic hydrocarbon. It is considered as fundamental basis for all carbon allotropes, and their conceptual depiction are shown in Figure 1. It represents that 2D graphene sheet can be enclosed into 0D like fullerene structure and rolled up into 1D-like carbon nanotube structure, and 10 layers of graphene can be stacked up into 3D graphitic-like structure. Hence, it is considered as “mother of carbon allotropes” [13]. The fabrication of graphene film by different synthetic routes was adapted accordingly to its required properties for many applications. Current technologies addressed to synthesize graphene via several routes are as follows: mechanical exfoliation (liquid exfoliation and scotch tape method), epitaxial growth (chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and from organic molecules method), unzipping CNT (chemical and electrochemical methods), and wet chemical process (oxidation of graphite) [14].
Carbon allotropes in different forms: 0D Bucky ball, 1D nanotubes, 2D sheets, and 3D graphite form (without permission from Ref. [13]).
Graphene possesses exclusive chemical, physical, mechanical, and thermal properties, which focuses on the field of electrochemical applications as an electrode material to enhance the stability and durability of the devices. Graphene application in any devices is adopted according to its properties as shown in Figure 2. Prominently, the conductivity of anode and cathode electrodes plays a vital role in batteries, which collect or disperse the electrons that tune up the performance to device. The conjugated sp2 carbon networks of 2D graphene sheet exhibit high conductivity around 104–106 S/cm than any other carbon materials depending on the number of layers [15, 16]. Additionally, the electrode surface area is an essential part for batteries, which has high theoretical surface area of graphene, and is reported to be ∼2600 m2/g [17]. For suspended graphene sheets below 10 nm thickness, the spring constants were observed between 1 and 5 N/m, and pristine graphene exhibits Young’s modulus of 1.05 TPa and intrinsic strength of 110 GPa, which has high mechanical property [18, 19]. The electrochemical property is a perspective for energy storage and generation technologies. The rate of heterogeneous electron transfer occurs on graphene materials; in the meantime, the rate of reaction varies selectively at edges and basal plane according to their electroactive sites by adding impurities or doping. Graphene-based materials were potentially applied in electrochemical devices due to their inherent electrochemical activity nature [20]. These amazing properties of graphene such as electrical, mechanical, and electrochemical were attracted for rechargeable batteries.
Properties of graphene and its appropriate application.
It is well known that graphene can be synthesized by several routes and named according to the recovered final product. Graphene research has elevated gradually in the past 5 years for its tremendous properties, but the scientific community ends up with the confusion in naming the material. Even though researchers have synthesized up to 100 layers of carbon sheets, they were naming them as graphene. This provides different changes in properties compared with the single-layer graphene sheet for their practical applications [21]. Hence, carbon journal community raised a nomenclature for graphene family, which is shown in (Table 1).
Materials | Description |
---|---|
Graphene | Two-dimensional sheet with one atom thickness |
Turbostratic graphene | Arrangement of graphene sheets in rotational fault structure |
Bi-,tri-, or multilayer graphene | Stacking of graphene sheets (2 - bi, 3 - tri, & 4 - 10 – multi) in AB, ABA, or rotational order |
Few layer graphene | Subset of multilayer graphene |
Graphite nanosheets, nanoflakes, and nanoplates | Lateral/thickness of graphene sheets <100 nm. |
Exfoliated graphite | Exfoliation of bulk graphite |
Graphene nanoribbon | Length dimension in micron and width in the range of nanometer |
Graphene quantum dots | Lateral dimension less than 10 nm with photoluminescence property |
Graphene oxide | Graphene sheets that contain functional groups (epoxy, hydroxyl, and carboxyl) |
Graphite oxide | Exfoliation of bulk graphite by strong oxidation process |
Reduced graphene oxide | Reduction or restoration of sp2 carbon of graphene oxide |
Graphenization | Growth of graphene by small molecules (bottom-up approach) |
Free-standing graphene, graphene foam, hydrogel, and aerogel | Graphene sheets arranged in 3D forms |
Nomenclature of graphene based on the structure.
The descriptive term is an essential thing for researchers in the area of graphene material because the properties will change accordingly with recovered product with different synthetic strategies. For example, the graphene-based transparent conducting film adopted by the CVD method obtained 600 ohms/sq. at 96.5% transmittance at 550 nm, whereas solution processed graphene increases above 10 K ohms at the same transmittance [22, 23, 24]. Even the electrochemical behavior fluctuates according to the synthetic strategies; for instance, the presence of oxygen functional groups in graphene oxide (GO) shows an excellent electrochemical behavior rather than the pristine graphene [25]. Hence, the electrochemical device applications based on graphene electrodes depend on the architecture and hybrid composites to improve the active sites. Recently, 3D architecture like graphene materials such as foams, hydrogel, aerogel, and free-standing was utilized in electrochemistry-oriented topics.
For designing and fabricating large scale macroscopic or microscopic architecture like materials, the choice of precursor signifies the synthetic strategies. Graphene sheets synthesized by wet chemical process commenced for several applications due to the presence of functional groups. As discussed in the previous section, the methods utilized for the preparation of graphene sheets conclude their suitable application based on their properties. Noteworthy, there is a challenge for high dispersion of graphene either in aqueous or in organic solvents. It has been achieved by dispersing agent introduced into hydrophobic graphene sheets for good dispersion, whereas it submerges the graphene properties [26]. In the view of fact, large scale solution processable GO has several advantages such as cost effective, eco-friendly solvent and facile to introduce any foreign material due to the presence of functional groups [27, 28]. The copious amount of functional groups attached to the graphene surface contains hydroxyl and epoxy groups at basal planes and carboxyl groups at edges. This leads to affinity with water molecules, which provides a higher dispersion and further it assists with other inorganic or organic molecules for facile composite preparation. In the choice of precursor for free-standing material preparation, GO dominates as a building block due to its features of large scale solution processable with high colloidal dispersion. The resultant macroscopic FSG holds as an excellent mechanical, electrical, and light-weight material. Further, the 3D architecture of FSG enhances the surface area, porous nature, and structural active sites by merging with other functional host materials such as semiconducting material, metal nanoparticles, and polymers. The synergy of graphene sheets and functional host materials in the 3D macroscopic architecture attracted wide variety of applications due to the tuning of their properties.
In 1998, Smalley prepared CNT buckypaper by vacuum filtration, in prior it is well dispersed in Triton X-100 surfactant to break up the pi-pi interaction between the bundled ropes of CNT [29]. Further, CNT buckypapers were prepared by domino pushing technique, and they are strong, robust, and flexible. The obtained paper exhibits 26 micron thickness; the electrical conductivity was found to be 2.0 × 104 S/m and thermal conductivity shows 153 W/mK [30]. These papers were directly applied for supercapacitor application. Thus, the carbon paper–like materials were potentially applied in a variety of applications due to their light-weight, highly flexible, robust, and eco-friendly nature. On the basis of cost, the CNT papers lag behind for the practical applications, and they have been replaced by graphene sheets. Similar to CNT buckypaper, GO paper was fabricated by flow-assisted vacuum filtration or evaporation techniques. Figure 3a and b shows the photograph of flexible GO paper and mechanical properties comparison chart of GO paper, buckypapers, vermiculite paper-like material, and graphite foil, respectively. Young’s modulus is as high as in GO papers with 42 GPa for vacuum-assisted technique, and similar tensile strength but lowest Young’s modulus (12.7 GPa) was obtained for evaporation-induced self-assembly technique [31, 34]. Thus, the high mechanical properties of GO paper can be used in several applications such as supercapacitors and other flexible substrates [35]. Moreover, the mechanical properties of GO papers depend on the alignment of GO sheets by any chemical modification between the layers and at the edges. The modifications are made either by crosslinking or grafting between the two sheets as GO has several functional groups that covalently attached to other molecules [36, 37]. The intercalation, functionalization, and interaction between the GO sheets provide high mechanical stiffness for paper-like material. Moreover, the atmospheric humidity affects the mechanical property of the GO paper, increase in the relative humidity to 100%, the GO colloidal solution absorbs water from moisture and it bulges to 70% which decreases the tensile strength [34]. The functionalization on graphene surface also affects the mechanical properties depending on the functional moieties as well as the bonding nature [38, 39, 40]. The electrical properties of GO papers depend on the synthetic methods as several changes were observed in structures and reduction ratios of C/O. Upon exposing to the hydrazine vapor, the conductivity of GO papers increased by four order of magnitude from 8.5 × 10−4 to 170 S/cm. Further enhancement in conductivities of GO paper was developed by treating the paper with mixture of argon/hydrogen/hydrazine vapors [41]. The removal of the oxygen group is the main factor to restore the sp2 carbon network by chemical or thermal treatment. The chemical reductive treatment efficiently removes the oxygen moieties from the GO paper, whereas the thermal treatment shows high restoration of sp2 carbon network but less removal of oxygen functional groups. Recently, a rapid reduction treatment was proposed by immersing the GO papers in hydrohalic acids, viz., HI and HBr, which shows a remarkable electrical conductivity around 298 and 3220 S/cm, respectively [32, 42]. Based on the facile chemical treatment, the electrical conductivity of FSG improvement was shown by treating the GO papers in metal halides like MgI2, AlI3, ZnI2, and FeI2 that exhibit 550 S/cm [33].
(a) Photograph of flexible graphene oxide paper, (b) comparison chart of mechanical properties of GO paper with other flexible paper materials, (c) effect of FSG electrical conductivity changes w.r.t its properties upon HI treatment in different scale of time, and (d) electrical conductivity versus the Raman and XPS data of GO paper reduced by different metal halides (without permission from Refs. [31, 32, 33]).
Owing to these attractive mechanical and electrical properties of FSG material, it played vital role in flexible device technologies based on electrochemical energy storage and generation, actuators, sensors, and catalysts. Based on the attractive graphene properties and its nomenclature, the graphene oxide has fascinating properties which has layered structure similar to graphene that containing oxygen functional groups such as carboxyl, hydroxyl and epoxy. These functional groups were highly dispersed in DI water; hence, it is well aligned over vacuum filtration process. The GO paper is peeled off after vacuum drying and subjected to reducing treatment, as synthesized FSG material is directly utilized as current collector in place of Al, Cu, Ni foam, etc., for energy storage applications.
Battery is an electrochemical energy storage device that is cost-effective and eco-friendly and with cyclic durability, excellent overall performance, and long-term stability. In this decade, lithium ion battery (LIB) is successfully commercialized worldwide for portable electronic devices, and it has approximately 200 kWh scale for transportation and stationary storage [43]. On comparison with other secondary-based batteries such as sodium sulfur, redox flow, Ni-Cd, etc., Li ion cells have gathered the most commercial interest because they provide high energy and power densities, respectively. In contrast, other secondary batteries are under development stage for consideration in commercial package over LIB due to its major drawback as follows: large scale storage, cost of materials, toxicity, cyclic performance, or stability issues. However, the better system in secondary batteries credited for LIB because the redox potential of −3.04 V vs. SHE (standard hydrogen electrode) for Li/Li+ which has high electropositive in periodic table and light weight material with small ionic radius. Henceforth, the charge-discharge rates enhance and power densities vary in the ranges of 500–2000 W/kg [44]. In commercialized LIBs, the existing negative electrode is a graphite-layered structure material coupled with the host material and LiCoO2 has positive electrodes. Similar to LIBs, the other systems were also focused since it lags behind to reach the theoretical specific capacity (400 Wh/kg) that requires for electric vehicles for long term usage. Hence, other kinds of secondary batteries have been discovered such as Li-sulfur, sodium-ion battery (SIB), sodium-sulfur, Li-air, Zn-air, and flow batteries.
Conventionally, LIBs are made up of graphite anode and LiCoO2 layered material as cathode sandwiched between LiPF6 (1.0 mol/L) as an organic electrolyte dissolved in ethylene carbonate (EC) and dimethyl carbonate (DMC) in 1:1 volume ratio [45]. While LIB is charging, deintercalation happens at cathode, where the Li ions are removed from the layered LiCoO2 by releasing electrons to cathode. The released Li ions are transported to anode with the help of the electrolyte system and finally intercalated into graphite by gaining electrons. The same process is reversed during the discharging process.
Designing of anode materials for LIBs has focused much attention on retaining large reversible specific capacity. Beyond the graphite anode, few metal oxides and metal alloys were developed as anode material, and the lithiation and delithiation processes were investigated. Specifically, FSG paper outpaces the other candidates such as carbon nanotube (CNT) paper or graphite foil due to their tremendous properties as discussed earlier. Importantly, the electrical and mechanical properties of FSG are potentially applied for flexible device application. However, the FSG electrode itself does not provide higher capacity (approximately 100 mAh/g), which is not applicable as anode in LIB; instead, it has good cycling stability. Therefore, the host material that has high electrochemical active sites is incorporated into FSG for improvement of capacity in the device. This extends the large volume expansion in FSG electrodes for an efficient Li ions intercalation. One of the advantages of this FSG hybrid electrode is that it excludes the nonconducting polymer binders as additives. Conventional electrode-based materials were obtained as powders and coated on the metal foils in the form of ink using additives like polymer binders and conducting additive, whereas the FSG hybrid electrode plays dual role as a current collector and conductive additive.
In 2005, LIBs were fabricated with free-standing electrode based on CNTs prepared by vacuum filtration method [46]. Significantly, the free-standing electrode fabrication is a facile route in comparison with the conventional electrode since the mixture of active material, polymer binder, and conductive additive in solvent coated on metal foils. The CNT free-standing electrode provides reversible discharge capacity of 200 mAh/g at 0.08 mA/cm2. Further, the specific capacity was enhanced by the CVD grown free-standing CNT that delivers 572 mAh/g at 0.2 mA/cm2 [47]. This is a quite interesting result obtained for free-standing electrodes rather than the conventional electrodes. Meanwhile, the usage of high-cost material CNTs as free-standing electrodes lags behind manufacturing process. From this point of view, inexpensive material graphene prepared by chemical methods provides large scale production as dispersion in many solvents. This dispersion is readily subjected to vacuum filtration to prepare FSG paper with desired thickness. Usually, the discharge capacity of 298 mAh/g decreased to 240 mAh/g after 50 cycles for graphite electrodes with 81% retention capacity. But the FSG paper itself as anode provides huge irreversible discharge capacity, i.e., 680 mAh/g at initial cycle dropped to 84 mAh/g second cycle. The retention capacity is very poor compared to graphite electrode and therefore it is concluded to be not a suitable candidate for anode material [48]. This helps infer that solid electrolyte interface (SEI) formation is a significant parameter to reduce the storage capacity in FSG electrodes.
To potentially apply FSG as anode material in LIBs, the second phase material with highly electrochemical active sites should be composited to enhance the capacity. In this regard, Lee et al. composited Si NPs on GO sheets, vacuum filtered, and followed by thermal treatment to produce FSG/Si nanoparticle (NP) paper. This work delivers high Li ion storage when compared to pristine FSG electrodes. Si NPs intercalated between the graphene sheets of FSG paper that facilitates good 3D graphite-like framework and provides high Li ion storage even at high current density [49]. Another work has been reported with similar hybrid FSG/Si NPs, whereas a facile route has been introduced to fabricate. The specific capacity of 708 mAh/g was observed without any loss even after 100 cycles and this is mainly due to the larger volume change in graphene-Si composite. It also denotes the performance of device with an efficient electron and charge transfer contributed by graphene sheets that minimize the internal resistance of the electrodes [50]. Zhang et al. prepared Si hollow nanosheets using Mg as template and connected with graphene sheets to obtain free-standing electrodes by layer-by-layer method followed by HI reduction treatment. The specific capacity was examined during flat and bent state, which delivers similar results without any loss. Remarkably, Si/FSG paper anodes retain high reversible capacities even at long cycles, which reveals their retention capacity. They exhibit specific capacity of 660 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g current density after 150 cycles with 99% coulombic efficiency [51]. As mentioned earlier, all the Si NPs are highly expensive in terms of manufacturing process and hence a low cost method plays a significant factor. To tackle this issue, Cai et al. prepared Si NPs on CNT surface using low-cost Al-Si alloy as starting material and further inserted with graphene sheets to form a self-standing hybrid anodes for LIBs. Comparing with bare Si/CNT or Si/Graphene anodes, Si-CNT/FSG hybrid electrode, it delivers 1100 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g current density after 100 cycles. Addition of CNT was involved to disperse the Si NPs on the surface and provide network between the graphene sheets for conductivity enhancement as well as improved Li ion intercalation for efficient charge transfer [52].
Metal oxides (MOs) play an important role in LIBs as anode material and their poor conductivity restricts their application. Hence, introducing the conductive phase into MOs provides high retention capacity with long-life cycling stability. The theoretical reversible capacity of SnO2 is 782 mAh/g and its poor performance is due to low cycling with serious volume expansion. With this regard, SnO2 NPs dispersed on GO surface, followed by vacuum filtration to obtain free-standing electrodes and used as two different LIB anodes by thermally reduced and chemically reduced respectively [53, 54]. The specific capacity of 438.5 mAh/g at 0.1 A/g and 700 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g has been delivered for the two different reduction methods for SnO2 NPs/FSG electrodes. In both the cases, capacity fading is not observed even after the 50 cycles owing to the good anchoring of SnO2 and graphene sheets. Further, other metal oxides TiO2, Mn3O4, Fe3O4, and CuO nanostructured materials are incorporated into the FSG and are investigated for their performance in anode application for LIBs that delivers 269 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g, 692 mAh/g at 0.05 A/g, 544 mAh/g at 10 A/g, and 698.7 mAh/g at 0.67 A/g capacities, respectively [55, 56, 57, 58, 59]. Commonly, all these metal oxides’ specific capacity shows a reasonable capacity with the long-life cycling after incorporating the MOs into FSG electrodes due to the following aspects: (1) Interaction of GO and MO precursors increases, which enhances the well dispersive growth of MO NPs on graphene sheets. (2) Anchoring of MOs and graphene enhances the volume expansion/contraction for lithiation/delithiation process. (3) The cycling stability increases compared to pristine MO anodes even after several cycles owing to its structural phase remain stable after alloying/de-alloying process of lithium ions. (4) MOs avoid the aggregation of graphene stacking that leads to larger void space to penetrate the electrolyte and make a strong interface with the electrochemical active MOs for an efficient Li ion storage.
Further, with the controlled synthesis of oxygen, functionalized CNT/FSG electrodes were fabricated for anode application in LIBs. The battery performance is based on the oxygen functional groups in the electrodes that have been investigated. An optimization in weight ratios of CNT/FSG and heat treatment improves the volumetric and gravimetric capacitances. The CNT/GO hybrid at a ratio of 1:1 shows higher volumetric capacity of 260 mAh/cm3 that reduced at 200°C, while lower capacity of 43 mAh/cm3 for 900°C treated CNT/GO. Whereas, at high current densities, the role of oxygen in capacity role suppress for 200°C larger than the 900°C [60]. This implies the importance of CNT intercalation between the graphene sheets of FSG electrodes. Zhang et al. demonstrated the defect-rich MoS2 NSs/graphene/CNT hybrid paper as anode material for LIBs. In this design, MoS2 facilitates the lithium ion storage due to the high active sites at the edges and the electrical conductivity improved by the network of CNTs attached to the graphene sheets. In addition to the conductivity enhancement, the porosity of the FSG electrodes increased by the network of CNT sandwiched graphene sheets. On the whole, the binder-free and substrate-free hybrid anode papers deliver high reversible capacity of 1137.2 mAh/g at 0.1 A/g current density with good cycling stability [61]. This framework induces a novel pathway to incorporate other host materials to understand the CNT/FSG electrodes. Recently, several transition metal oxides provide high reversible theoretical capacities compared with the commercialized graphite anode. To the CNT/FSG electrode network, transition metal oxides such as Fe2O3 [62], CuO [63], MnO [64], and CoSnO3 [65] were incorporated as electrochemical active phase into the framework and investigated as anode material performance for LIBs. All these hybrid papers exhibit high reversible capacity of 716 and 600 mAh/g at 0.5 A/g current density more than 50 cycles for Fe2O3 and CuO nanobox, respectively. Apart from this, an enhanced capacity was observed for CoSnO3 and MnO NPs at high current density of 2 A/g, which delivers 676 and 530 mAh/g, respectively. Individually, the CNT/FSG and transition metal oxide anodes were found to have a drastic decrease of specific capacity upon increasing the current density, whereas a slight decrease of specific capacity was observed after hosting the metal oxides into CNT/FSG framework. Reasons for high reversible capacity and good cyclic stability of metal oxide-CNT/FSG electrodes are very similar due to the following merits: (1) incorporation of metal oxides improves the Li ion kinetics and enhances the charge transfer due to highly conductive CNT network between the graphene sheets; (2) 3D framework of CNT/FSG has highly porous nature, large specific surface area, and large volume change, which has well dispersion of metal oxide NPs onto the carbon surfaces; and (3) long cycling due to good attachment of metal oxide with CNT/FSG, whereas greater the volume expansion, higher the Li ion intercalation.
Interestingly, Cao et al. designed a unique layered nanostructure of porous ternary ZnCo2O4 on graphene sheets and fabricated as flexible anode and investigated its electrochemical performance. And also they constructed full cell with LiFePO4 as cathode material that deposited on FSG paper as slurry by homogenous mixing of conductive additive and polymer binder [66]. Figure 4a shows the photograph of flexible Li-ion battery fabricated by FSG hybrid electrodes. The half-cell of ZnCo2O4/FSG anode delivers higher specific capacity of 791 mAh/g at 1 A/g after 1000 cycles with 97.3% of capacity retention and concludes that it has an excellent cycling stability. Figure 4b shows the rate capability of the flexible battery with different current densities ranging from 0.5 to 10 C. This full cell delivers 40 mAh/g even at 10 C rate and the specific capacitance remains the same after the current density decreased to 2 C, which shows a good reversibility. The full cell has FSG paper as current collector for both the anode and cathode that are composited with ZnCo2O4 and LiFePO4 as host materials, respectively. It operates at 2 V with initial charge of 143 mAh/g and coulombic efficiency of 97.2%, which is comparable to existing LIB. The specific capacity is maintained at 90 mAh/g with high capacity retention under flat and bent states over 100 cycling process, which implies the flexibility of the device as shown in Figure 4d. It represents that graphene conductivity is unchanged while bending the device.
(a) Photograph of flexible full cell Li-ion battery with FSG/ZnCo2O4 as anode and FSG/LiFePO4 as cathode, (b) charge-discharge curve of full cell at 0.5 C rate, (c) charge-discharge rate capability at different rates, and (d) capacity variation on flat and bent state during cycling at 2 C rate (without permission from Ref. [66]).
Ahead of LIBs, SIBs have attracted the research community as the resources of Na are inexhaustible across the globe. In comparison with LIBs, the redox potential is −2.71 V vs. SHE and only the radius is 55% larger than the Li ions. Larger radius influences to focus on suitable material for insertion/extraction of Na ions effectively. The researchers focused on developing an efficient anode material for SIBs that involves carbon-based families and Na intermetallic compounds. The first cycle-specific capacity of sodium-antimony and sodium-phosphorous shows 600 and 2596 mAh/g, respectively [67, 68, 69]. Specific capacities drop after first cycles due to the internal cracking in the electrodes upon Na ion insertion. It leads to hinder the electrical properties and dissolution of electrode materials to electrolyte. The hard carbon with large interlayer distance that functions as anode material for SIBs and delivers more than 200 mAh/g of capacity even after 100 cycles was reported elsewhere.
The porous nature and structure of the FSG could facilitate the accommodation of host materials such as transition metal chalcogenides (TMCs), which are electrochemically active for the Na ions for alloying process. David et al. reported that the MoS2/FSG composite papers exhibit an excellent cyclic stability with high reversible capacity of 338 mAh/g at 0.025 A/g. It is the first report and opens the pathway to apply free-standing electrodes for SIB anode [70]. The cyclic stability was enhanced in flower-like MoS2 incorporated on graphene foam prepared by one-step microwave-assisted synthesis. It offers stable capacity of 290 mAh/g at 0.1 A/g after 50 cycles compared to previous MoS2/FSG electrode. The cycling performance is enhanced due to highly conductive 3D graphene foam and well-dispersed MoS2, which shields as well as avoids the strain during the sodiation/desodiation process at anode [71]. With the significance of MoS2 TMC for SIB anodes, further investigation was followed by incorporating other TMCs such as WS2 and Co0.85Se into FSG [72, 73]. As mentioned in LIBs, the electrochemical behavior can be increased by introducing the heteroatoms into the graphene sheets. Heteroatom-doped FSG electrode performance was investigated for SIB anode, where the nitrogen improves the electronic conductivity and fluorine expands the interlayer for an efficient accommodation of Na ions. This delivers a reversible capacity of 56.3 mAh/g at 1 A/g for 5000 cycles. It indicates that the doping of heteroatoms enhances the cycling stability of SIB anodes. Figure 5a shows the discharge/charge profile before and after the bent state, which remains with the same capacity at current density of 0.05 A/g. It reveals the mechanical strength of the FSG electrodes that is suitable to fabricate flexible pouch cell [74]. Even though the above said materials show an excellent cyclic stability, still it is necessary to improve the specific capacity of SIBs. It is well known that Na3P has theoretical capacity of 2600 mAh/g, where its demerits are very similar to those of Si electrode in LIBs. Because of high pulverization, fast capacity fading and also it hinders the electrical contact which lags behind in the electrochemical stability. Lots of effort have been made by assembling red P into carbon matrix to overcome these problems. Red P was composited on carbon nanofibers (CNFs) and dipped in GO solution followed by HI treatment providing P-CNF/FSG electrodes. In this architecture, CNF network enhances the pathway of electron transport rapidly and the role of graphene sheets to improve the conductivity as well as to avoid the breakup of bonds P–P from electrodes. This work demonstrates a significant capacity of 406.6 mAh/g at 1 A/g after 180 cycles [77]. Moreover, the graphene sheets have been utilized as a multifunctional conductive binder, and hard carbon/FSG as anodes for SIBs was constructed. It delivers high reversible capacity of 372.4 mAh/g and shows capacity retention of 90% over 200 cycling. A superior performance is observed in the absence of PVDF binder with higher rate capabilities and converting the rigid nature of hard carbon into flexible graphene sheets [78].
(a) Discharge/charge profile of heteroatoms (N and F)-doped FSG electrode at bent and normal state for SIBs. (inset: The photograph of FSG pouch cell illuminated with LED), (b) comparison of specific capacity and coulombic efficiency of bare FSG and N-doped FSG for Li-S battery. Cross-sectional SEM images of (c) discharged and (d) re-charged macroporous FSG electrodes (without permission from Refs. [74, 75, 76]).
Akin to SIBs, FSG electrodes play a major role in other rechargeable secondary batteries such as Li-S, Li-air, and Zn-air. The higher specific energy is a significant parameter for transportation and stationary applications, and in that case, Li-S batteries offer advantages but it is limited with few challenges discussed later. The highest theoretical capacity of Li-S system is 2600 Wh/kg, which is highest than the LIB due to highest capacity of Li-S cathode sulfur has 1675 mAh/g. The most challenging part is to improve the electronic conductivity of cathodes of Li-S as the sulfur exhibits poor conductivity of 10–17 S/cm as well as the formation of polysulfides at cathodes. These polysulfides oxidize the Li anode and get back to cathodes and re-oxidize, thus lowering the performance of Li-S system. An extensive effort has been made to improve the cathodes by incorporating the carbon additives to sulfur to minimize the unnecessary reactions. Initially, mesoporous FSG was prepared and the sulfur was deposited by vapor treatment and was utilized as cathodes for Li-S system. It delivers charging capacity of 1288 mAh/g with high coulombic efficiency that reveals the restriction of sulfur to dissolute polysulfides in mesoporous FSG framework [79]. Similar to LIB and SIBs, the electrochemical behavior of cathode in Li-S system enhanced for heteroatom-doped FSG electrodes. Figure 5b shows the comparison of FSG and N-doped FSG capacity and coulombic efficiency with different cycle number. The heteroatom-doped FSG shows superior performance than the bare FSG due to the high interaction of polysulfides with heteroatoms that increase specific capacity. The nitrogen doping effect in FSG minimizes the concentration of polysulfides and forms a uniform layer of Li2S at cathode. This system delivers 1000 mAh/g at 0.335 A/g after 100 cycles [75]. In another work, Zhu et al. developed free-standing cathodes by CNTs that were interconnected with the sulfur-graphene walls and investigated the electrochemical behavior that delivers 1346 mAh/g at 0.17 A/g current density. It is due to sulfur at graphene walls that deals to provide dual response as follows: (i) hinder the dissolution of polysulfides minimizing the shuttle phenomenon and (ii) offer volume expansion even at high quantity of sulfur. Moreover, its capacity retention shows 40% when current density is increased to 16.7 A/g owing to the good electron pathway by CNTs connected with graphene nanosheets [80]. Further, nanosized Li2S (25–50 nm) particles incorporated into FSG papers by vacuum filtration process demonstrated an excellent cycling and rate capability with reversible capacity of 816.1 mAh/g at 0.1675 A/g (150 cycles) and 597 mAh/g at 11.7 A/g (200 cycles). This shows excellent performance in electrochemical behavior due to the uniform distribution of Li2S particles on graphene sheets that minimize the barrier for Li ion transport and particularly it has superior wetting nature to interconnect the polysulfides with graphene network into the paper electrodes [81]. Similarly, Chen et al. designed an efficient hierarchical nanostructure like nanobundled forest with Li2S/few-walled CNTs at FSG obtained solution processing followed by self-assembly method as cathodes. In this design, CNTs assembled in shaft-like structure and Li2S as active material, whereas the graphene sheets act as barrier for Li2S. It achieves high capacity of 868 and 433 mAh/g at current density of 335 and 16.7 A/g, respectively. This originates from the good framework between CNTs and graphene sheets as well as the uniform distribution of Li2S, and moreover, the barrier of graphene sheets for Li2S reduces the dissolution of polysulfides. Overall, the influence of void space enhances the volume change and thus improves the cycling stability of Li-S battery [82].
Recently, metal-air batteries have inspired much attention apart from the above said battery systems due to their high theoretical capacity than the metal-ion and Li-S batteries. The metal-air batteries can be operated in aqueous or nonaqueous medium based on the selection of metals. The nonaqueous medium is well suited for the Li-air batteries that deliver high capacity than in aqueous medium but still there are some issues when it comes to the practical application. The development of cathode in Li-air is significant as it is the main compartment to breathe oxygen for delivering high capacity of the system. There are a lot of reports for cathode development based on metal oxides grown on Ni foam as binder-free electrodes. The role of FSG electrodes was also investigated as cathodes for Li-air batteries. First, Kim et al. developed graphene nanoplates (GNP)/GO composite paper-like electrodes as cathodes for Li-air battery system. The wrinkled nature of the paper electrodes induces the high surface area and also delivers higher discharge capacity of 9760 mAh/g at 0.1 A/g current density. This superior performance is due to the reduced overpotential, and the difference in consumption/evolution of O2 is minimized. On the whole, the system exhibits higher efficiency in OER (oxygen evolution reaction)/ORR (oxygen reduction reaction) of 87% [83]. The same group developed macroporous FSG paper with surface area of 373 m2/g and pore volume of 10.9 cm3/g with 91.6% of porosity that exhibits a high specific capacity of 12,200 mAh/g at 0.2 A/g. The rate capability is enhanced where it shows high cycling performance even at higher current density of 0.5 and 2 A/g that delivers approximately 1000 mAh/g. This is attributed to the minimized volume expansion that limits the decomposition and formation of Li2O2 at the macroporous nature of FSG. While discharging/charging the macroporous FSG, the nature of FSG electrode decomposes the discharge products completely that reveals its highly porous structure as shown in the Figure 5c and d [76]. Researchers investigated the effect of FSG cathodes in Li-air upon introduction of metal oxides, namely, α-MnO2 and NiCo2O4. Upon insertion of α-MnO2 into FSG electrodes, the overpotential decrease was caused during charge/discharge process. It delivers 2900 mAh/g for the higher content of α-MnO2 that was reported and shows the catalytic improvement in this study [84]. And Jiang et al. reported an excellent reversible capacity of 5000 mAh/g at 0.4 A/g by incorporating mesoporous NiCo2O4 into macropores of FSG. It also lowers about 0.18 and 0.54 V of overpotential for discharge and charge, respectively [85].
In this chapter, FSG electrodes in battery applications signify their potential advantages to the fabrication technology. The fabrication of FSG electrode is facile as well as it excludes some additives applied in conventional electrodes. At present, the electrode of spent batteries contains active materials, binder, and metal foil, which set hurdles for recycling process. Herein, the FSG hybrid electrodes provide good capacity and cycling for battery application without binder and metal current collector. This exclusion provides light weight and flexible batteries and also there is a pathway to discover a facile route to recover the materials from FSG hybrid–based spent batteries in future.
This work was supported by South China Normal University. F.C. thanks the support from Outstanding Young Scholar Project (8S0256), the Project of Blue Fire Plan (CXZJHZ201709), and the Scientific and Technological Plan of Guangdong Province (2018A050506078).
The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.
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I am also a member of the team in charge for the supervision of Ph.D. students in the fields of development of silicon based planar waveguide sensor devices, study of inelastic electron tunnelling in planar tunnelling nanostructures for sensing applications and development of organotellurium(IV) compounds for semiconductor applications. I am a specialist in data analysis techniques and nanosurface structure. 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I received a B.Eng. degree in Computer Engineering with First Class Honors in 2008 from Prince of Songkla University, Songkhla, Thailand, where I received a Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering. My research interests are primarily in the area of biomedical signal processing and classification notably EMG (electromyography signal), EOG (electrooculography signal), and EEG (electroencephalography signal), image analysis notably breast cancer analysis and optical coherence tomography, and rehabilitation engineering. I became a student member of IEEE in 2008. During October 2011-March 2012, I had worked at School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, University of Essex, Colchester, Essex, United Kingdom. In addition, during a B.Eng. 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