I would take this opportunity to thank my research supervisor, family and friends for their support and guidance without which this research would not have been possible.
DECLARATION
I, [type your full first names and surname here], declare that the contents of this dissertation/thesis represent my own unaided work, and that the dissertation/thesis has not previously been submitted for academic examination towards any qualification. Furthermore, it represents my own opinions and not necessarily those of the University.
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Abstract
The past several years have witnessed a rapid development in the wireless network area. So far wireless networking has been focused on high-speed and long range applications. However, there are many wireless monitoring and control applications for industrial and home environments which require longer battery life, lower data rates and less complexity than those from existing standards. What the market need is a globally defined standard that meets the requirement for reliability, security, low power and low cost. For such wireless applications a new standard called ZigBee has been developed by the ZigBee. The aim of this thesis work is to design fully functional ZigBee module, and to evaluate an application in a sensor network. This thesis work has resulted in fully functional ZigBee module, respectively. It is also shown that ZigBee sensors can be networked wirelessly. Eventually it is the authors hope that the modules will be used within ITN, and also be developed further for new applications.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION6
Aims and Objectives6
Method6
Structure of the thesis7
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW8
ZigBee Alliance8
Network topologies9
Modulation/Spreading11
Wireless Sensor Networks14
Sensor Nodes14
The Rise of the MEMS14
Sensor Nodes Capabilities and Constraints15
Hierarchy of Sensor Nodes16
Wireless Sensor Networks Characteristics16
CHAPTER 3: BACKGROUND18
CHAPTER 4: DESIGN PROCESS20
Design Description20
Components20
Programming22
Data Interface23
RF Transceiver/Microcontroller Configuration and Data Interface25
PCB Overview30
CHAPTER 5: IMPLEMENTATION33
PCB Manufacturing33
Assembly34
Soldering34
Bill of Material34
Assembled Modules34
CHAPTER 6: TEST APPLICATION36
Temperature Coordinator36
Temperature Sensor37
CHAPTER 7: EVALUATION39
CHAPTER 8: CONCLUSIONS41
REFERENCES42
APPENDIX44
Chapter 1: Introduction
The past several years have witnessed a rapid growth of wireless networking. However, up to now wireless networking has been mainly focused on high-speed communications, and relatively long range applications such as the IEEE 802.11 Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) standards. The first well known standard focusing on Low-Rate Wireless Personal Area Networks (LR-WPAN) was Bluetooth. However it has limited capacity for networking of many nodes. There are many wireless monitoring and control applications in industrial and home environments which require longer battery life, lower data rates and less complexity than those from existing standards (Akyildiz, 2002, 393). For such wireless applications, a new standard called IEEE 802.15.4 has been developed by IEEE. The new standard is also called ZigBee, when additional stack layers defined by the ZigBee Alliance are used.
Aims and Objectives
The objective of this thesis is to develop fully functional wireless ZigBee and IEEE 802.15.4 modules. This includes design using Protel DXP 2004, and implementation of the ZigBee protocol stack. To evaluate the new standard, a literature study must be performed. A test application will also be developed, in order to test the functionality of the ZigBee modules.