UAV-based 3D localization of passive UHF-RFID tags empowering outdoor stock management

The management of stocks in outdoor warehouses and shipyards is not a trivial task, and UHF-RFID technology represents an attractive candidate to face it. This paper presents the application of a fast 3D Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) method sped up through Particle Swarm optimization (PSO) for localizing goods tagged with passive UHF-RFID tags by exploiting a remotely piloted Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). The UAV carries reader and antenna and can freely move in the three directions of the space, by forming synthetic arrays with a large aperture length along the three spatial directions. The UAV trajectory is measured through a differential GPS system. Performance is validated through an experimental analysis which demonstrates the feasibility of the proposed system.