New Revision of IEEE 802.15.6 Wireless Body Area Networks

Abstract

Body Area Networks (BANs) is an active field of research and development because it offers the potential of significant improvement in the delivery and monitoring of healthcare, especially for senior people or patients with chronic conditions monitored at home.Other applications may include tracking the performance of athletes, and recently the potential integration to vehicles aided by Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) to deliver high-performance communication flows to 5G and Wi-Fi networks.The standard IEEE 802.15.6™–2012 Wireless BANs aimed to solve the former issues. To address the latter, an amendment to such a standard is currently developed by the Task Group IEEE 802.15.6a. This amendment enhances the Ultra-Wideband (UWB) physical layer (PHY) and medium access control (MAC) to support dependability to human body area networks (HBAN) and adds support for vehicle body area networks (VBAN). VBAN operates under strict compliance to standards and limits for electromagnetic interference (EMI) from the vehicle’s electric and electronic systems.