Integrated Active Pulsed Reflector for an Indoor Local Positioning System

This paper presents an indoor localization system based on a frequency modulated continuous wave radar in the industrial-scientific-medical band at 5.8 GHz. An integrated active pulsed reflector behaves as a backscatter by regenerating the incoming phase with phase coherent startup at a constant frequency. The base station (BS) determines the distance to this reflector with a round-trip time-of-flight measurement. The active pulsed reflector is built around a switchable and tunable oscillator. The circuit has been fully integrated in a 0.18-¿m CMOS technology. Outdoor measurements revealed a positioning accuracy of 15 cm, while in a harsh multipath environment with omnidirectional antennas a positioning accuracy of 32.88 cm was measured. The localization system is capable of detecting multiple reflectors at the same time, and no synchronization between BSs is needed.