US-12618936-B2 - System for controlling a radiofrequency sensing

US12618936B2US 12618936 B2US12618936 B2US 12618936B2US-12618936-B2

Abstract

The invention refers to a system for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network 100 . The network is adapted to perform different radiofrequency sensing modes, e.g. RSSI-, CSSI- or Doppler based modes. The system 130 comprises a providing unit 131 for providing environmental information, wherein the environmental information is indicative of a physical property of one or more surfaces in an environment of the network. A selecting unit 132 is adapted for selecting and/or modifying a radiofrequency sensing mode to be performed by the network, wherein the radiofrequency sensing mode is selected and/or modified based on the environmental information, and a controlling unit 133 is adapted for controlling the network 100 to perform the selected and/or modified sensing mode Taking the physical properties of surfaces in an environment into account and modifying and/or selecting the utilized radiofrequency sensing mode accordingly increases the reliability and the accuracy of the radiofrequency sensing.

Inventors

Peter Deixler
HUGO JOSÉ KRAJNC

Assignees

SIGNIFY HOLDING B.V.

Dates

Publication Date: 20260505
Application Date: 20220106
Priority Date: 20210222

Claims (14)

1 . A system for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network, the network having a plurality of network devices, the network being adapted to perform different radiofrequency sensing modes, the system comprising: an environmental information providing unit for providing environmental information, wherein the environmental information being indicative of a physical property of one or more surfaces in an environment of the network, the physical property being indicative of a material and/or a texture of the one or more surfaces; a selecting unit for selecting and/or modifying at least one of the radiofrequency sensing modes to be performed as radiofrequency sensing by at least a part of the network, the at least one radiofrequency sensing mode being selected and/or modified based on the environmental information; and a controlling unit for controlling the at least a part of the network to perform the at least one selected and/or modified radiofrequency sensing mode, wherein, when the environmental information indicates at least one possible radiofrequency signal propagation path between network devices of the at least a part of the network that contains a shallow reflection on a horizontal plane, the selection unit is adapted to select as the at least one radiofrequency sensing mode an RSSI-based sensing mode at least for the part of the network, and the shallow reflection has a reflection that does not allow the reflected radiofrequency signal to be detected by the network device having sent the radiofrequency signal.
2 . The system according to claim 1 , wherein the network is adapted to perform as radiofrequency sensing modes at least one of a channel state information, CSI, based sensing mode, a received signal strength indicator, RSSI, based sensing mode and a Doppler based sensing mode.
3 . The system according to claim 1 , wherein the physical properties are indicative of an interaction of the surface with a radiofrequency signal utilized for the radiofrequency sensing.
4 . The system according to claim 3 , wherein the selecting and/or modifying comprises simulating propagation paths of radiofrequency signals between the network devices of at least the part of the network based on the environmental information.
5 . The system according to claim 3 , wherein the selecting and/or modifying is further based on regions of interest information indicative of the location of subjects of interest and/or objects in the environment in which the radiofrequency sensing is of interest.
6 . The system according to claim 5 , wherein the selecting unit is arranged for selecting and/or modifying at least one of the radiofrequency sensing modes to be performed as radiofrequency sensing by at least a part of the network for vital sign detection, gait detection and/or gesture detection of one or more persons, and the region of interest information refers to a region in which the one or more persons are present in a predetermined time period.
7 . The system according to claim 2 , wherein, if the environmental information indicates a high radiofrequency signal attenuation in the environment of the network, the selecting unit is adapted to select as radiofrequency sensing mode an RSSI-based sensing mode.
8 . The system according to claim 1 , wherein, if the environmental information indicates non-homogeneous surface materials in the environment of the network, the selecting unit is adapted to select as radiofrequency sensing mode a CSI-based sensing mode.
9 . The system according to claim 8 , wherein, if the environmental information indicates a leakage of radiofrequency signals through a part of a non-homogeneous wall materials, the selecting unit is adapted to modify the CSI-based sensing mode.
10 . The system according to claim 9 , wherein the modifying comprises identifying radiofrequency signals with signal paths having a signal strength that is lower than a predetermined signal strength and ignoring these radiofrequency signals during a radiofrequency sensing.
11 . The system according to claim 1 , wherein the environmental information comprises at least one of a LIDAR scan of the environment, a panoramic image scan, a building plan and/or an image of at least a part of the environment of the network.
12 . A network comprising: a plurality of network devices adapted to perform a radiofrequency sensing, wherein the network devices are adapted to perform different radiofrequency sensing modes, and a system according to claim 1 .
13 . A method for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network, the network having a plurality of network devices, the network being adapted to perform different radiofrequency sensing modes, the method comprising: providing environmental information, the environmental information being indicative of a physical property of one or more surfaces in an environment of the network, the physical property being indicative of a material and/or a texture of the one or more surfaces; selecting and/or modifying at least one of the radiofrequency sensing modes to be performed as radiofrequency sensing by at least a part of the network, the at least one radiofrequency sensing mode being selected and/or modified based on the environmental information; when the environmental information indicates at least one possible radiofrequency signal propagation path between network devices of the at least a part of the network that contains a shallow reflection on a horizontal plane, selecting as the at least one radiofrequency sensing mode an RSSI-based sensing mode at least for the part of the network, the shallow reflection having a reflection that does not allow the reflected radiofrequency signal to be detected by the network device having sent the radiofrequency signal, and controlling the at least a part of the network to perform the at least one selected and/or modified radiofrequency sensing mode.
14 . A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising computer program code to perform the method of claim 13 when the computer program code is run on one or more processors.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO PRIOR APPLICATIONS This application is the U.S. National Phase application under 35 U.S.C. § 371 of International Application No. PCT/EP2022/050207, filed on Jan. 6, 2022, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 63/137,335, filed on Jan. 14, 2021 and European Patent Application No. 21158417.2, filed on Feb. 22, 2021. These applications are hereby incorporated by reference herein. FIELD OF THE INVENTION The invention relates to a system, a method and a computer program product for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network. Further, the invention relates to a network comprising a system for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of the network. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Currently, radiofrequency sensing is often performed using two different measures that are indicative of a wireless radiofrequency communication link. One of these common methods refers to using the received signal strength indicator (RSSI) for measuring an overall attenuation of a wireless radiofrequency signal between two network devices. Another commonly used method refers to using the channel state information (CSI) representing the signal propagation of the wireless radiofrequency signal between two network devices along multiple spatial paths. Generally, the CSI provides very detailed information on the environment with which the radiofrequency signal has interacted and thus allows for a very accurate sensing, for instance, of very small movements like breathing movements. However, it has been noticed that although theoretically a CSI-based measuring is very accurate, in many applications the accuracy is very low due to unexpected interactions of the radiofrequency signal with the environment. RSSI-based sensing methods on the other hand do not provide the same sensing performance as CSI-based sensing methods, since the RSSI measurement provides less detailed information on the radiofrequency signal. However, RSSI-based measurement methods are less influenced by environmental conditions and thus provide a very reliable sensing performance. It would thus be advantageous to provide a radiofrequency system that allows for a reliable and/or accurate sensing, if necessary. WO 2021023725A1 discloses a method for selecting a communication technology in a radio frequency (RF)-based sensing system with one or more nodes. The RF-based sensing system is configured for performing RF-based sensing using one or more of two or more different communication technologies. A communication technology for performing RF-based sensing in the RF-based sensing system is selected for one or more of the nodes based on one or more parameters related to RF-based sensing in the RF-based sensing system. The parameters can include sensing application parameters, sensing quality parameters, system resource parameters, and contextual parameters. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a system, a network, a method and a computer program product that allow for a reliable and accurate radiofrequency sensing. In a first aspect of the present invention, a system for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network comprising a plurality of network devices is presented, wherein the network is adapted to perform different radiofrequency sensing modes, wherein the system comprises a) an environmental information providing unit for providing environmental information, wherein the environmental information is indicative of a physical property of one or more surfaces in an environment of the network, b) a selecting unit for selecting and/or modifying at least one of the radiofrequency sensing modes to be performed as radiofrequency sensing by at least a part of the network, wherein the at least one radiofrequency sensing mode is selected and/or modified based on the environmental information, and c) a controlling unit for controlling the at least a part of the network to perform the at least one selected and/or modified radiofrequency sensing mode. Since the selecting unit is adapted to select and/or modify at least one radiofrequency sensing mode based on environmental information indicative of a physical property of one or more surfaces in an environment of the network, the radiofrequency sensing can be performed based on the radiofrequency sensing mode, for instance, an RSSI or CSI sensing mode, that provides the best results in the environment of the radiofrequency sensing network. In particular, taking the physical properties of surfaces in an environment of the network into account and modifying and/or selecting the utilized radiofrequency sensing mode accordingly increases the reliability and the accuracy of the radiofrequency sensing. The system is adapted for controlling a radiofrequency sensing of a network comprising a plurality of network devices. Generally, a radiofrequency sensing network comprises at least two network devices, more preferably at least three network devices.