Power Beacon Placement for Maximizing Guaranteed Coverage in Bistatic Backscatter Networks

TL;DR

This paper investigates optimal placement of power beacons in bistatic backscatter networks to maximize the guaranteed coverage distance, considering both energy transfer and backscatter link performance, with analytical and algorithmic solutions.

Contribution

It introduces a symmetric power beacon placement scheme optimized for maximum coverage distance, incorporating the backscatter link performance into placement decisions.

Findings

Symmetric PB placement outperforms benchmark schemes.

Optimal placement can be derived analytically or via an efficient algorithm.

System parameters significantly influence coverage distance.

Abstract

The bistatic backscatter architecture, with its extended range, enables flexible deployment opportunities for backscatter devices. In this paper, we study the placement of power beacons (PBs) in bistatic backscatter networks to maximize the guaranteed coverage distance (GCD), defined as the distance from the reader within which backscatter devices are able to satisfy a given quality-of-service constraint. This work departs from conventional energy source placement problems by considering the performance of the additional backscatter link on top of the energy transfer link. We adopt and optimize a symmetric PB placement scheme to maximize the GCD. The optimal PB placement under this scheme is obtained using either analytically tractable expressions or an efficient algorithm. Numerical results provide useful insights into the impacts of various system parameters on the PB placement and the resulting GCD, plus the advantages of the adopted symmetric placement scheme over other benchmark schemes.