MHz-band RF signal propagation characteristics on human body for intra-body communication

Near-Field Coupling Communication (NFCC) is a technology that uses the surface of the human body as a data transmission path in the MHz-Band. It is important to assess the loss of signal propagation on the human body to design stable NFCC links. We measured the signal propagation characteristics on a phantom which is equivalent to the human body with an electrically isolated probe and a transmitter driven by a battery. In addition, we evaluated the signal loss characteristics with a high frequency structure simulator. We found dependencies of signal loss on distance in both the experiments and simulations and also revealed the correlation between the distance of the phantom from floor ground and the dependency of signal loss on a reclining phantom.