Spatial and Material Optimization for Novel Sustainable and Radio-Frequency-Friendly Micro-Homes

Abstract

The paper addresses the issue of designing a novel building that is sustainable, spatially optimized and also RF-friendly. The latter term is used to indicate that building materials guarantee good radio-signal penetration (in the range of frequencies of interest for commonly used wireless standards) and good reflection behavior indoors, thus enabling the use of innovative RF-based non-invasive human-monitoring systems that take advantage of RF-scattering-rich environments. The need for connectivity is becoming, more and more, a key inhabitant requirement. Nevertheless, so far, there are no examples of architectural designs that take into account the need for connectivity at the beginning of the design stage. As a consequence, once the house and the building material have been designed, then providing high-quality wireless connectivity services might become challenging. Therefore, the paper presents the design of a novel “house-concept” for vulnerable social groups that is made of a novel sustainable building material. Such a novel building material has been experimentally characterized in terms of dielectric properties. Simulation results have shown that such a material is not RF-friendly and solutions have been proposed to improve its RF propagation behavior and enable the use of a novel RF-sensing monitoring system.