Power Management Schemes for NFC

YOGESH SINGH

Electronics and Telecommunication, St. Francis Institute of Technology

Contents

• Introduction

• NFC Operating modes

• Applications

• NFC vs Bluetooth

• Factors leading to Power Consumption

• Power Reduction Techniques

• Conclusion

• Reference

2Power Management Schemes for NFC

Introduction

• NFC or Near Field Communication is a short range high

frequency wireless communication technology.

• Extension of Radio frequency identification.

• Contactless communication between handheld devices.

• NFC is an extension of Radio frequency identification.

• Range of upto 10cms(3.9inches).

3Power Management Schemes for NFC

Evolution of NFC

• In 2004, NFC Forum was formed by Nokia, Philips, Sony to set standards for NFC .

Every NFC enabled device will have an “N-Mark” trademark ,developed by NFC

Forum.

Fig.1.Trademark by NFC Forum [ ]

4Power Management Schemes for NFC

Features

• It operates within the globally available and unlicensed radio

frequency band of 13.56 MHz, with a bandwidth of 14 kHz.

• Supported data rates: 106, 212 and 424 Kbit/s.

• For two devices to communicate using NFC, one device must

have an NFC reader/writer and one must have an NFC tag.

5Power Management Schemes for NFC

NFC Reader

• Microcontroller-based

• generating radio frequency at 13.56 MHz

• transmit energy to a tag and read information back from it

• The reader continuously emits RF carrier signals

6Power Management Schemes for NFC

NFC Tag

• Passive

• The passive tag absorbs energy emitted by the reader

• Starts sending information

• FSK or Phase modulation.

7Power Management Schemes for NFC

Operation of NFC

• NFC has two communicative terminals :

• INITIATOR

• TARGET

Fig.2.Operation of NFC [ ]

8Power Management Schemes for NFC

Modes of Operation

• NFC operates in two modes:

-Active Mode

-Passive Mode

To be more precised NFC operates in three modes

-Reader/writer mode

-Peer-to-Peer mode

-Card Emulation mode

9Power Management Schemes for NFC

Active Mode

• In this mode, both devices with NFC chip can generate an

electromagnetic field and exchange information with each

other.

Fig.3. Active Communication Mode

10Power Management Schemes for NFC

Passive Mode

• A passive device, such as an NFC tag, contains information

that other devices can read but does not read any information

itself, so there is only one active user.

Fig.4. Passive Communication Mode

11Power Management Schemes for NFC

Operating Modes

• Reader/writer mode

• Peer-to-Peer mode

• Card Emulation mode

12Power Management Schemes for NFC

Applications

13Power Management Schemes for NFC

NFC vs Bluetooth

NFC BLUETOOTH

Range 0 to 10cms 0 to 100meters

Parallel Connect 2 Devices Many

Speed 400Kbps 2Mbps

Power Consumption Very Low High

Connection Ease Very Easy Difficult(Handshake

Required)

Mode Both Active and Passive Only Active

Application Usage Short connections Prolonged Connections

Security Very High High

14Power Management Schemes for NFC

Factors Leading to Power Consumption

• Scanning

• Sharing

• Collision

• Interferences

• Prolong Connection Duration

15Power Management Schemes for NFC

Power Consumption Reduction

• PTF-Determinator- 12% of the energy can be saved on average

• FSS and BIN-the battery drain can be reduced by up to 34%

• Protocol-Independent Detection- consumes only 1%

16Power Management Schemes for NFC

Conclusion

• We have seen NFC and its operational modes and also the factors leading to power consumption. In the next stage we will discuss some power reduction techniques.

17Power Management Schemes for NFC

References

• Richard G. Mair, “Protocol-Independent Detection of Passive Transponders for Near-Field Communication Systems.” IEEE Transactions On Instrumentation And Measurement, vol. 59, no. 4, April 2010.

• L. Biao, H. Ai-Qun, and Q. Zhong-Yuan, “Trends and brief comments on anti-collision techniques in radio frequency identification system,” Proc. 6th Int. Conf. ITS Telecommun., pp. 241–245, 2006

• Manuel Menghin, Norbert Druml, Christian Steger, Reinhold Weiss, Holger Bock and Josef Haid, “The PTF-Determinator: A run-time method used to save energy in NFC-Systems.”, Fourth International EURASIP Workshop on RFID Technology,2012.

• Manuel Menghin, Norbert Druml, Bernhard Kipperer, Christian Steger, Reinhold Weiss,Holger Bocky and Josef Haidy “Energy Efficiency by Using Field Strength Scaling for Multi-Transponder Applications” 12th International Conference on Telecommunications - ConTEL 2013.

18Power Management Schemes for NFC

THANK YOU

19