An Approach to Hopfield Network-Based Energy-Efficient RFID Network Planning

Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) Network Planning (RNP) is the problem of placing RFID readers in a working area where a tag is interrogated by at least one reader and at the same time satisfies some constraints such as minimum number of placed readers, minimal interference, and minimal outside coverage. The RNP optimization has been proven NP-hard; thus, natural-inspired approaches are often used to find the optimal solution. The paper proposes an energy-efficient RNP approach in which the positions of placed readers are optimized by a Hopfield network, and the energy efficiency is achieved through a placement area restriction technique. A mechanism of redundant reader elimination is also added to minimize the number of placed readers. Simulation results show that the Hopfield network-based energy-efficient RNP approach achieves the maximum tag coverage and energy efficiency by reducing interference, outside coverage, and the number of placed readers.