RF energy harvesting and management for near-zero power passive devices

We present RF energy harvester and management strategy tailored for the passive near-zero power devices. Radio-less RF-powered backscattering tags that have the ability to recognize and localize activities in the surrounding environment are example of such devices. We propose a management strategy that determines the operation regime of the harvester based on the input power level at which harvester provides the instantaneous supply voltage for device operation. As the input power exceeds this level, the storage of the excess energy is managed by an adaptive capacitor charging circuit that keeps the voltage at the input of voltage regulator constant. We demonstrate that backscatter-based RF tag in the listening mode of operation can instantaneously operate with an input power of -34.4 dBm. Due to the adaptive capacitor charging circuit, the power efficiency of the energy harvester is higher than 50% over a range of input powers from -25 dBm up to -5 dBm.