Integrated circuit manufacturing, how to understand electronic tags and RFID radio frequency identification systems

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The birth of RFID radio frequency identification technology

RFID technology was born during World War II and was first used by the Royal Air Force to identify its own and allied fighters. In order to identify the returning aircraft, the United Kingdom equips the Allied aircraft with a radio transceiver. When the interrogator on the control tower transmits an interrogation signal to the returning aircraft, the transceiver on the aircraft receives the signal. A signal is sent back to the interrogator, which identifies the enemy and the enemy based on the received return signal. This is the first RFID identification system identified, and the first practical application of the first RFID.

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Since then, RFID technology has also been applied to wildlife tracking, road toll systems and other fields. After the 1990s, with the rapid development of integrated circuit manufacturing and information technology, RFID technology has become increasingly mature, and its cost has become lower and lower, which has gradually attracted people's attention.

RFID radio frequency identification definition

The full name of RFID in English is Radio FrequencyIdentification, radio frequency identification, also known as electronic tag, radio frequency identification, inductive electronic chip, proximity card, proximity card, contactless card, electronic bar code.

RFID radio frequency identification is a non-contact automatic identification technology. It automatically recognizes the target object and acquires relevant data through the radio frequency signal. The identification work can work in various harsh environments without manual intervention.

RFID technology can recognize high-speed moving objects and recognize multiple labels at the same time, which is quick and easy to operate. Short-range RF products are not afraid of harsh environments such as oil stains and dust pollution. Bar codes can be replaced in such environments, such as tracking objects on the assembly line of a factory. Long-range RF products are mostly used for transportation, and the recognition distance can reach several tens of meters, such as automatic charging or identification of vehicle identity.

RFID system architecture

A typical RFID system is mainly composed of a reader, an electronic tag, an RFID middleware, and an application system software. Generally, the middleware and application software are collectively referred to as an application system.

▲ RFID system structure

In actual RFID solutions, RFID systems contain some basic components. Components are divided into hardware components and software components.

From the perspective of function realization, the RFID system can be divided into two parts: the edge system and the software system. The edge system mainly completes the information perception and belongs to the hardware component part; the software system completes the processing and application of the information; the communication facility is responsible for the entire RFID system. Information transfer.

▲ Basic components of radio frequency identification system

1, electronic label

Electronic Tag, also known as a transponder or Smart Label, is a miniature wireless transceiver that consists mainly of a built-in antenna and chip.

▲ Electronic label

2, reader

A reader is a device that captures and processes RFID tag data. It can be a single individual or embedded in other systems. The reader is also one of the important components that make up the RFID system. Because it can write data into the RFID tag, it is called a reader.

The hardware part of the reader is usually composed of transceiver, microprocessor, memory, external sensor/actuator, alarm input/output interface, communication interface and power supply.

▲ schematic diagram of the reader

3, the controller

The controller is the command center for the orderly operation of the reader chip. The main functions are:

Communicate with application system software;

Execute the action instructions sent from the application system software;

Control the communication process with the tag;

Encoding and decoding of baseband signals;

Perform an anti-collision algorithm;

Encrypting and decrypting data transmitted between the reader and the tag;

Perform identity authentication between the reader and the electronic tag;

Control of other external devices such as keyboards and display devices.

Among them, the most important is the control operation of the reader chip.

4, reader antenna

The antenna is a device that receives or radiates the power of the front-end RF signal in the form of electromagnetic waves. It is an interface device between the circuit and the space, and is used to realize the conversion of the guided wave and the free space wave energy. In the RFID system, the antenna is divided into two categories: an electronic tag antenna and a reader antenna, which respectively bear the functions of receiving energy and transmitting energy.

The characteristics of the RFID system reader antenna are:

Small enough to be attached to the item you need;

Directionality with omnidirectional or hemispherical coverage;

Capable of providing the chip with the largest possible signal;

Regardless of the direction of the item, the polarization of the antenna can match the interrogation signal of the card reader;

Robust

cheap price.

The main factors to consider when choosing a reader antenna are:

Type of antenna;

The impedance of the antenna;

The performance of the RF applied to the item;

The performance of the RF when there are other items surrounding the labelled item.

5. Communication facilities

Communication facilities provide secure communication connections for different RFID system management and are an important part of RFID systems. Communication facilities include wired or wireless networks and serial communication interfaces for readers or controllers to be connected to a computer. The wireless network can be a personal area network (PAN) (such as Bluetooth technology), a local area network (such as 802.11x, WiFi), or a wide area network (such as GPRS, 3G technology) or a satellite communication network (such as a synchronous orbit satellite L-band RFID system) .

Advantages and disadvantages of RFID technology

1. Advantages:

RFID chips and RFID readers are highly resistant to substances such as water, oil and chemicals.

The reading of information is not limited by the size and shape of the chip, and it is not necessary to match the fixed size and printing quality of the paper for the purpose of reading accuracy. Moreover, the RFID tag is being developed in a small form and in various forms for application to different products. .

RFID technology recognition is more accurate than traditional smart chips, and the distance of recognition is more flexible. Penetration and barrierless reading can be achieved.

The RFID chip tag can repeatedly add, modify, and delete internally stored data to facilitate information update.

Internal data content is protected by passwords, making its content less susceptible to forgery and alteration.

The data capacity of the RFID chip is large, and as the technology develops, the capacity has an increasing trend.

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2, disadvantages:

Technological maturity is not enough. RFID technology has a short time and is not very mature in technology. Due to the reverse reflective nature of UHF RFID tags, it is difficult to apply in metal, liquid and other commodities.

high cost. RFID electronic tags are relatively expensive compared to ordinary bar code labels, which are dozens of times larger than ordinary bar code labels. If the usage is large, the cost will be too high, which greatly reduces the enthusiasm of the market for using RFID technology.

Security is not strong enough. The security problems faced by RFID technology are mainly caused by illegal reading and malicious tampering of RFID electronic tag information.

Technical standards are not uniform. RFID technology has not yet formed a unified standard, and multiple standards coexist in the market, resulting in incompatible RFID tags of different enterprise products, which in turn causes confusion in the application of RFID technology to a certain extent.

Development status and prospects of RFID technology

With the continuous reduction of the cost of RFID equipment, the gradual unification of standards, the extensive application of digital information technology in various industries, and the expansion of scale application industry, RFID technology will have broader development prospects, and its potential value will be exerted. The RFID technology industry will gradually grow and mature.

RFID radio frequency identification technology has gradually developed into an independent and interdisciplinary field of expertise. RFID RFID technology combines a large number of technologies from completely different fields of expertise (eg, high frequency technology, electromagnetic compatibility technology, semiconductor technology, data protection and cryptography, telecommunications technology, manufacturing technology, etc.).

In the past ten years, RFID radio frequency identification technology has been rapidly developed, and it has been widely used in many fields of traceability and anti-counterfeiting applications such as industrial automation, commercial automation, and transportation control management. With the advancement of technology, the types of products based on RFID radio frequency identification technology will become more and more abundant, and the application will become more and more extensive. It is expected that RFID radio frequency identification technology will continue to maintain rapid development momentum in the next few years.

In general, RFID radio frequency identification technology is currently developing towards standardization, low cost, low error rate, high security, and low power consumption.

standardization

Industry standards and related product standards are still not uniform. Electronic labels have not yet formally formed a unified (including various frequency bands) international standards.

low cost

At present, the lowest price of an electronic label in the United States is about 20 cents. Such a price cannot be applied to some single-piece products with lower value. Only when the unit price of the electronic label drops below 10 cents, it can be applied to the whole scale. The whole package of goods.

Low error rate

Although the single technology of RFID electronic tags has matured, the overall product technology is not mature enough, and there is still a high error rate (the ratio of RFID misreading is sometimes as high as 20%), and it is also needed in integrated applications. Overcome a lot of technical problems.

High security

The currently widely used passive RFID system does not have a very reliable security mechanism, and the data cannot be kept secret. The RFID data is also vulnerable to attack, mainly because the RFID chip itself and the chip are in the process of reading or writing data. Easy to be exploited by hackers.

Application fields of RFID technology

Access control: personnel access control monitoring management

Animal Monitoring: Animal Husbandry Management, Pet Identification, Wildlife Ecology Tracking

Transportation: Highway toll system

Logistics Management: Baggage identification, inventory, logistics and transportation management for air transportation

Automatic control: classification of automobile, home appliance, electronics industry, assembly line management

Medical applications: Hospital medical record system, instrumentation equipment management

Material Management: Automated inventory and control system for factory materials

Quality Tracking: Product Quality Tracking, Feedback

Resource recovery: management of pallets, recyclable containers, etc.

Anti-theft application: Anti-theft management in supermarkets, libraries or bookstores

Anti-counterfeiting: Anti-counterfeiting for brand-name tobacco and alcohol and valuables

Waste treatment: garbage collection and disposal, waste control system

Joint ticket: multi-purpose smart stored value card, card, etc.

Dangerous goods: Ordnance firearms, detonator explosive control

RFID will build a bridge between the virtual world and the physical world. It is foreseeable that in the near future, RFID technology will not only be widely adopted in various industries, but eventually RFID technology will be integrated with ubiquitous computing technology and have a profound impact on human society.

As a global manufacturing base, China will be the world's largest RFID application market in the future. This will be a rare opportunity for domestic research institutions and enterprises.

Source: Wanjian Technology