Edge-based hybrid system implementation for long-range safety and healthcare IoT applications

Fan Wu, Chunkai Qiu, Taiyang Wu, Mehmet Rasit Yuce

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer-review

59 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In many conventional Internet of Things (IoT) applications, data is transferred directly from the sensor network to the cloud via a gateway for further data processing. However, this typical usage of a gateway is not suitable for every application. For short-range IoT wireless protocols (e.g., Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE)), multiple gateways are required to achieve broader coverage, which is inconvenient. In this paper, an edge-based hybrid network system architecture is presented. The proposed system consists of hybrid routers and an IoT gateway. The router supports two wireless protocols, BLE and Long Range (LoRa), and is equipped with a solar energy harvester to extend the router’s lifetime. It can extend the coverage of short-range BLE network by utilizing LoRa wireless technology, and support fundamental edge computing tasks such as preliminary data processing. The IoT gateway can support multiple IoT protocols, including LoRa, BLE, and XBee. It can perform more advanced edge computing tasks, such as data filtering, storage, processing, user interface, and cloud connection. Three case studies incorporating a wearable safety monitoring sensor network, a healthcare monitoring application, and a smart hospital application are studied with the proposed edge network system to demonstrate its promising capabilities to support IoT applications. Experimental evaluations indicate that, by processing data at the edge, the minimal delay is only 11.5 ms. Furthermore, with the hybrid LoRa network implementation, the BLE network can be extended to 2.4 km.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)9970-9980
Number of pages11
JournalIEEE Internet of Things Journal
Volume8
Issue number12
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 15 Jun 2021

Keywords

  • BLE
  • Cloud computing
  • Computer architecture
  • Edge computing
  • edge computing
  • gateway
  • Internet of Things
  • Logic gates
  • LoRa
  • Medical services
  • wireless sensor network.
  • Wireless sensor networks

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