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March 7, 2002

Technology to replace bar codes available, prof says

The technology that eventually will replace bar codes as product identifiers is available today, according to Marlin Mickle, Nickolas A. DeCecco Professor in Pitt's School of Engineering.

Richard E. Billo, a former Pitt professor now at Oregon State University, and Mickle demonstrated the technology in summer 2000 using commercially available radio frequency identification (RFID) tags, in a project funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Mickle and his research team had another breakthrough in RFID technology in 2001 when the team became the first to incorporate an antenna directly onto a complementary metallic oxide semiconductor chip in order to have that chip relay information to a base receiver.

This antenna on a chip — called PENI Tag, for product emitting numbering identification tag — could replace present RFID tags, the current industry technology, by year's end. The technology also could open the door for myriad other uses, from anti-counterfeit technology to biofeedback for people with epilepsy and heart problems.

The most immediate application of the antenna on a chip, however, is to help RFID technology replace bar codes on commercial products. "RFID tags are destined to replace bar codes in many commercial applications, eliminating the problem of finding the bar code and correctly orienting it toward the scanner," said Mickle. "The primary drawback, at this time, has been the relatively high cost of the RFID tag compared to current bar codes."

RFID tags are manufactured with a silicon chip containing the needed information, such as price, model number or serial number. The chip is attached to an antenna that transmits the information to a receiver, and both the chip and antenna are mounted on a plastic or paper tag.

The expense of assembling the chip and the antenna and affixing them to the tag is primarily responsible for the high cost, which, at 30-50 cents each, dissuades many manufacturers from using them.

"The people in the industry always said that the technology wouldn't take off until the cost approached a penny a tag," said Mickle. "Well, it appears our chip can be made for pennies in current projected volumes, hence the name, PENI Tag."

The small size of the chip, 2.2 millimeters square, makes it less conspicuous and less likely to be removed or tampered with by consumers. Mickle hopes to reduce the size of the product to 1,000 microns square — less than half its current size.

The types of information that can be stored on the chip are virtually unlimited, because thousands of bytes of information can be stored on a single chip. Mickle and Ming-En Wang, Pitt assistant professor of industrial engineering, are exploring other uses for the chip.

Research by Mickle and his colleagues has led to remote sensing and energy harvesting for small devices. The chip harvests radio frequency energy, which it converts to direct current, to power the electronics and transmit the data. Mickle said that the distance the signal can carry — perhaps as far as 100 meters — would vary depending on circumstances.

Mickle's research has been supported primarily by the Pittsburgh Digital Greenhouse, a joint venture of Pitt and Carnegie Mellon created by former Gov. Tom Ridge to foster the "system-on-a-chip" industry in the Pittsburgh region.


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