GE Global Research, the technology development arm of the General Electric Company has come up with a battery-free, multi-detection radio-frequency identification (RFID) sensing platform that could enable a wide range of low cost wireless sensing products in healthcare, security, food packaging, water treatment and pollution prevention. GE’s unique RFID sensors are built on traditional RFID tags. Touted as the “first-of-its-kind” sensing platform, in which a single sensor can provide a highly selective response to multiple chemicals under variable conditions, operates without a battery.
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New sensors can be designed to be smaller than a penny and manufactured at very low cost. These new RFID sensors use a conventional RFID tag, but are coated with a chemically or biologically sensitive film. The sensor reader can obtain several varied responses, which allows the sensor to identify and measure individual chemicals in different mixtures and variable conditions. GE’s sensors can detect trace concentrations of toxic gases such as toxic industrial chemicals (TICs), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and chemicals in liquids.
The reader activates the sensor antenna and the RFID chip and collects several response data parameters. The measurement of these Radislav Potyrailo, a principal scientist at GE Global Research who leads this multidisciplinary wireless sensing development team, said, “We believe GE’s battery-free wireless sensing platform will be a game-changer across many product platforms in healthcare, security, water and pollution prevention, to name a few. Without the need for batteries, we can make sensors that are much smaller in size and at substantially reduced costs. These attributes, combined with the sensors’ highly selective chemical and bio sensing capabilities, provide new breakthrough sensing opportunities that will open the door to many new, innovative applications.”

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