Use of Animation Software in the Simulation of On-Body Communication Channels at 2.45 GHz

As wearable electronic devices become increasingly popular, there is a growing interest in the design of body area networks (BAN). The propagation characteristics of such channels are of interest to assist in proper design of BAN systems. It has been shown that body movement is a primary factor in channel fading and hence channel modelling must include the effect of movement. In this letter, results are presented for a walking phantom created using animation software. Simulations of a walking avatar for three different channels at a frequency of 2.45 GHz are shown and compared to measurements made on a human body in an anechoic chamber. It is shown that such a phantom can give good prediction of mean and standard deviation of the propagation channel of a walking subject.