Home Automation Systems

A special issue of Electronics (ISSN 2079-9292). This special issue belongs to the section "Networks".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 May 2016) | Viewed by 8956

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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Home automation is a central application domain of the ubiquitous computing paradigm. Home automation systems aim at offering residential user comfort and efficient home management by exploiting networked sensors and actuators. In recent years, home automation systems have attracted the attention of academia, industry and standards development organizations. The solutions suitable for residential scenarios include wireless or wired communication technologies, network protocols and architectures, and smart home applications. Since the automated home may have significant impact on humans’ daily lives, it is crucial to investigate the properties and performance limits of key home automation systems solutions. On the other hand, automated homes may be exposed to challenges such as mobility, interference and propagation issues, limited device energy availability, device hardware constraints, interoperability, and security. Problems including, but not limited to, the aforementioned ones need to be addressed for high performance and graceful integration of home automation systems with the Internet of Things. This Special Issue aims to cover the most recent advances in home automation systems, ranging from novel communication technologies and networking solutions to innovative smart home applications. Research papers focusing on the design and/or evaluation of solutions in the home automation systems space are invited. Reviews and surveys of the state-of-the-art are also welcomed. Dr. Carles GomezGuest Editor

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Keywords

Radio and wired network interfaces for home automation systems Protocols (including PHY/MAC/network/transport/application layer protocols) for home automation systems Protocol architectures for home automation systems Security/privacy in home automation systems Internet of Things-oriented home automation systems Standard specifications (e.g. IEEE, IETF, etc.) for home automation systems Solutions from industry consortia (e.g. Thread, etc.) for home automation systems Home energy management

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Article
Acoustic Wake-Up Receivers for Home Automation Control Applications
by Amir Bannoura, Fabian Höflinger, Omar Gorgies, Gerd Ulrich Gamm, Joan Albesa and Leonhard M. Reindl
Electronics 2016, 5(1), 4; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics5010004 - 15 Jan 2016
Cited by 13 | Viewed by 7915
Abstract
Automated home applications are to ease the use of technology and devices around the house. Most of the electronic devices, like shutters or entertainment products (Hifi, TV and even WiFi), are constantly in a standby mode, where they consume a considerable amount of [...] Read more.
Automated home applications are to ease the use of technology and devices around the house. Most of the electronic devices, like shutters or entertainment products (Hifi, TV and even WiFi), are constantly in a standby mode, where they consume a considerable amount of energy. The standby mode is necessary to react to commands triggered by the user, but the time the device spends in a standby mode is considered long. In our work, we present a receiver that is attached to home appliances that allows the devices to be activated while they are completely turned off in order to reduce the energy consumed in the standby mode. The receiver contains a low power wake-up module that reacts to an addressable acoustic 20-kHz sound signal that controls home devices that are connected to it. The acoustic wake-up signal can be sent by any kind of speaker that is available in commercial smartphones. The smartphones will operate as transmitters to the signals. Our wake-up receiver consists of two parts: a low power passive circuit connected to a wake-up chip microcontroller and an active micro-electromechanical system (MEMS) microphone that receives the acoustic signal. A duty cycle is required to reduce the power consumption of the receiver, because the signal reception occurs when the microphone is active. The current consumption was measured to be 15 μA in sleep mode and 140 μA in active mode. An average wake-up range of 10 m using a smartphone as a sender was achieved. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Home Automation Systems)
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