Unattended and tactical sensors are used by the U.S. Army’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) and Objective Force Warrior (OFW) to detect and identify enemy targets on the battlefield. The radios being developed as part of the Networked Sensors for the Objective Force (NSOF) are too costly and too large to deploy in missions requiring throw-away hardware. A low-cost miniature radio is required to satisfy the communication needs for unmanned sensor and munitions systems that are deployed in a disposable manner. A low cost miniature disposable communications suite is leveraged using the commercial off-the-shelf market and employing a miniature universal frequency conversion architecture. Employing the technology of universal frequency architecture in a commercially available communication unit delivers a robust disposable transceiver that can operate at virtually any frequency. A low-cost RF communication radio has applicability in the commercial, homeland defense, military, and other government markets. Specific uses include perimeter monitoring, infrastructure defense, unattended ground sensors, tactical sensors, and border patrol. This paper describes a low-cost radio architecture to meet the requirements of throw-away radios that can be easily modified or tuned to virtually any operating frequency required for the specific mission.

Date Published: 1 September 2004
PDF: 9 pages
Proc. SPIE 5417, Unattended/Unmanned Ground, Ocean, and Air Sensor Technologies and Applications VI, (1 September 2004);

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 5417:
Unattended/Unmanned Ground, Ocean, and Air Sensor Technologies and Applications VI
Edward M. Carapezza, Editor(s)