Objects tracking in a dense reader environment utilising grids of RFID antenna positioning

One of the fundamental constraints in radio frequency identification (RFID) large scale deployment, such as in warehouse RFID deployment, is the positioning of RFID reader antennas to efficiently locate all the tagged objects distributed in a dense RFID reader environment. For tracking the tagged objects in a dense RFID deployment, the required number of reader antennas must be optimised in order to reduce the overall cost. This study proposes highly accurate square and hexagonal grid-based positioning and tracking techniques mainly for use indoors and includes performance comparison of both of these grids. The study involves the design of the square and hexagonal grid reader antenna networks and position calculation using a diffusion algorithm. Both of these grids of RFID antenna positioning present a solution for the problem of the placement pattern of RFID reader antennas in a dense reader environment, hence an optimal number of required reader antennas and guaranteed coverage can be achieved. This study also presents a path loss model that can be applied to predict the radio signal strength information at a certain distance. The proposed diffusion algorithm estimates RFID tag position by using distance information between the reader and the tag. The obtained results show that a square grid can yield higher positioning accuracy compared to the hexagonal grid. The obtained results further show that the proposed tracking techniques can achieve an average positioning error below 1 m, which is 85% better in some cases than the results obtained by other known methods.