Sensors & Electronics
Awards & Recognition
FLC Awards
Radio frequency tags can be used in a variety of ways to help identify, inventory and track assets.
2002 - Radio Frequency Identification Tags for Tracking and Inventory
Developers: Curt Carrender*, Jill Farris, Ron Gilbert*, Mike Lind, Gary Morgan
Radio frequency tags are small, inexpensive tags that can be used to identify, inventory and track assets. The tags range in size from a grain of rice to a credit card, and can be encoded with detailed information.
Throughout the 1990s, PNNL engineers made significant advances in RF tag technology, creating tags that are smaller, less expensive, have up to 10 times the read range of previous tags, and can be read at relatively high rates. As a result, groups of items may be inventoried in minutes instead of days, and the exact location of a specific item can be determined at any time. In addition, full life cycle information - such as serial number, warranty information, purchase date, return for repair date and other information - can be written into the tagged items as they are read at different points in the supply chain. The technology won an R&D 100 Award in 2001.
In late 2000, Battelle created a new company called Wave ID to manufacture, market and distribute the RF tags developed at PNNL. Within a year, Wave ID was acquired by Alien Technology, a fast-growing California-based company with a patented technology that dramatically reduces the cost of manufacturing electronic products.
* Now with Alien Technology
Excerpted from PNNL FLC webpage.
Selected Links to Related Information:
- Related Examples (Same Project)
- Autonomous Sensor-communicator Module (24)
- Autonomous Sensors for Shipping Containers (212)
- Information Storage Security Assistant (213)
- Portal Monitor for Small, Moving Objects (27)
- Radio-Frequency (RF) Tags (29)
- Wireless Sensing for Rotating Equipment (211)
- Wireless Sensor Development Program (214)