Wearable Planar Magnetoinductive Waveguide WBANs: Bending Around Anatomical Curvatures

We recently reported a new class of wearable wireless body area networks (WBANs) based on planar magnetoinductive waveguides (MIWs) that offer extremely low-loss as compared to the state-of-the-art. Examining the bending effects of these WBANs around anatomical curvatures of the human body becomes crucial for their practical implementation. Previous work utilized mostly flat surfaces to evaluate performance of planar-MIW WBANs with only few quantitative data reported for bending scenarios around curved surfaces. In this paper, we provide the complete transmission performance characteristics of these WBANS over the entire frequency band (30-60 MHz) pertinent to several bending scenarios that were not reported in the past. Results demonstrate excellent overlap of transmission characteristics across the operating band with minimal change in performance across various bending scenarios, including extreme bending. Overall, the study confirms the potential of planar-MIWs to connect across various anatomical curvatures and to ultimately form a robust and reliable alternative for future wearable WBANs.