Magnetic Induction Based Sensing and Localization for Fresh Food Logistics

Sensing of food spoilage and contamination is an active area of research, with many types of contact and noncontact sensors are being developed that can track fresh food quality throughout the distribution process. In this paper, we consider the communication of the sensed product quality along with the box position (in the stack of boxes in the truck or in a warehouse room) to the next level, in order to make the logistics more efficient and less wasteful. Given the water-rich, inhomogeneous biological media, RF or ultrasonic based communications are inappropriate in such environments, and we instead explore Magnetic Induction (MI) based communication framework in the HF band (3-30 MHz). We propose a novel magnetic induction based localization scheme to localize the boxes and study its accuracy via extensive simulations. We show that with a small number of anchor nodes, the localization can be done without any errors for boxes as small as 0.5 meter on the side, and with small errors even for boxes half as big. Our preliminary analysis suggests that such sensors can last for several years without any battery replacement.