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King Fahd University Explores RFID's Potential
In a third project, the researchers designed a prototype system in which the same wristband tag can also be used to give patients access to locked pill cases, known as Mediboxes. The cases are designed with embedded RFID readers that can generate an alert when the time comes for a patient to take a pill. Each interrogator is connected to a microcontroller that regulates which medication is dispensed, and when. Status reports about patients are displayed on the box's LCD screen for the nurse or caregiver. The system could also be used in a hospital setting, Raad said, though integrating it with a medical facility's information systems could prove difficult.
Electricity Monitoring and Access-Control Projects
In another proof-of-concept project, KFUPM students were involved in building and testing an innovative system that the university could sell to electricity providers. The system would allow a company to charge individual users for their energy consumption, such as those holding meetings in a particular room at a conference center. The lab purchased a power meter that measures the amount of kilowatts being consumed, which was then connected to a microcontroller. Software written by the lab calculated the balance of a user's account, based on the level of credit that person carried, and the amount of electricity he consumed.
When the balance became too low, the system would send the user a warning to a mobile phone via text message. The system's designers used contactless MULTOS smart cards to store the credit balance for paying for electricity. When the building owner wants to utilize specific appliances, he must insert or wave his smart card in the proximity of a smart card reader, and if there is sufficient balance on the card, the appliances will be switched on and the balances will be deducted—much as they are in telecommunications applications.
In 2002, KFUPM was among the first universities in the region to establish a so-called "smart campus" based on Mifare contactless smart cards. The college has since issued 15,000 cards to its students, faculty and staff members, Raad told attendees, and the same cards are also used for library checkouts, photocopying, printing, meal payments and health services.
According to Raad, students now use these cards to enter authorized buildings and labs 24 hours a day. In the second phase of the project, the university is rolling out readers at classroom doors so students can check in and out of classrooms electronically. When a student moves his card close to an interrogator, the system compares the name associated with that card to that of the class roster, and attendance is taken electronically.
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Electricity Monitoring and Access-Control Projects
In another proof-of-concept project, KFUPM students were involved in building and testing an innovative system that the university could sell to electricity providers. The system would allow a company to charge individual users for their energy consumption, such as those holding meetings in a particular room at a conference center. The lab purchased a power meter that measures the amount of kilowatts being consumed, which was then connected to a microcontroller. Software written by the lab calculated the balance of a user's account, based on the level of credit that person carried, and the amount of electricity he consumed.
When the balance became too low, the system would send the user a warning to a mobile phone via text message. The system's designers used contactless MULTOS smart cards to store the credit balance for paying for electricity. When the building owner wants to utilize specific appliances, he must insert or wave his smart card in the proximity of a smart card reader, and if there is sufficient balance on the card, the appliances will be switched on and the balances will be deducted—much as they are in telecommunications applications.
According to Raad, students now use these cards to enter authorized buildings and labs 24 hours a day. In the second phase of the project, the university is rolling out readers at classroom doors so students can check in and out of classrooms electronically. When a student moves his card close to an interrogator, the system compares the name associated with that card to that of the class roster, and attendance is taken electronically.
