Internet of Radars: sensing versus sending with joint radar-communications

Abstract

The Internet of Things (IoT) is made up of interconnected devices for exchanging information through sensors and actuators. One of the main physical sensors to understand the environment beyond the visible world is a radar. Basically, radars have always been a military tool to investigate the environment. However, with the developing technology, radars have become more compact and affordable to use in a building, in a car, in a drone, or even in a wristwatch. In the near future, radar-equipped IoT platforms will start to appear increasingly. For each IoT platform, dual use of spectrum with dual aperture is required for sensing and communicating when using conventional approaches. Emissions from the radar and communication circuitries are the main causes of the increase in energy consumption for any radar sensing IoT device. Furthermore, an increasing number of radars cause congested spectrum, and RF convergence between radar and communication systems becomes more likely to present itself. In recent years, numerous research works have proposed using the single waveform for perceiving the environment and sending information. They are often called "joint radar-communication' (JRC) systems. As a result of the latest advancements in JRC system designs, radar sensing IoT platforms now can be transformed into an "Internet of Radars" (IoR). This article is an attempt to introduce a prospective research direction in order to develop the architectures necessary to make the IoR concept possible. In this article, we present a short survey of JRC technologies likely to be used on radar-sensing- capable IoT devices. Then possible application areas, challenges to enable JRC, and future research perspectives are proposed.