Special Session 17

SPECIAL SESSION #17

Alice Buffi

Departiment of Energy, Systems, Territory and Constructions Engineering, University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy

• alice.buffi@unipi.it

Luca Catarinucci

Department of Innovation Engineering, University of Salento, Lecce, Italy

• luca.catarinucci@unisalento.it

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technologies are increasingly utilized across various sectors, including logistics, warehouse management, access control, smart industries, animal identification, and worker safety. The key advantage of RFID lies in its ability to perform wireless identification without requiring a direct line of sight, enabling the unique recognition and monitoring of items, people, or animals. This facilitates the creation of real-time databases that track events of interest.

Low Frequency (LF) and High Frequency (HF) RFID tags have long been established for animal identification, providing a reliable means of uniquely recognizing animals both during their life and through subsequent stages, such as slaughter. However, the real challenge today lies in the adoption of Ultra High Frequency (UHF) RFID tags. UHF tags offer the significant advantage of monitoring large groups of animals simultaneously, allowing identification from a greater distance compared to LF/HF tags. Despite their advantages, organic tissues can interfere with UHF signals, limiting their effectiveness, and thus necessitating the development of tailored solutions to overcome this challenge.

Beyond simple identification, the localization and tracking of grazing or farm animals is of critical importance. Tracking animal locations helps monitor their activity and can alert farmers to potential dangers. Moreover, capturing animal motion is invaluable for understanding their behaviours, such as sleeping, eating, or running. When combined with other sensing technologies, RFID has the potential to offer a comprehensive solution for monitoring animal health, welfare, and productivity.

This session seeks to gather contributions that explore the use of RFID technologies for animal science applications, extending beyond mere identification to include localization, tracking, and motion analysis. By combining RFID with other sensing technologies, we aim to improve the understanding of animal behaviour and enhance the management of livestock in agricultural and animal science contexts.

Alice Buffi (Senior Member, IEEE) received the B.S. and M.S. (summa cum laude) degrees in Telecommunications Engineering and the Ph.D. degree (Doctor Europaeus) in “Applied electromagnetism in electrical and biomedical engineering, electronics, smart sensors, nanotechnologies”, from the University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy, in 2006, 2008 and 2012, respectively. In 2011, she was a Visiting Ph.D. student with the Queen Mary University of London, London, U.K..
Since 2012, she has been with the University of Pisa, where she is currently an Associate Professor with the Department of Energy, Systems, Territory and Construction Engineering. She has co-authored several international journal papers and international conference contributions, one European patent and one European patent application. Her current research topics include measurement methods to locate static or moving items, agents, or people through radio frequency identification (RFID) systems operating at the ultra-high-frequency (UHF) band for Industry 4.0 applications, safety and smart agriculture. Besides, she has interests in classification methods for smart gates and smart storage systems, ageing process in battery cells and wireless power transfer.
She was a recipient of the Best Paper Award at the 2019 IEEE International Conference RFID-TA, the Best Poster Award at the 2022 IEEE International Symposium on Measurements & Networking (M&N), the Best Poster Award at the 2023 IEEE International Conference RFID, and of the Young Scientist Award from the International Union of Radio Science, Commission B, in 2013 and 2016. She was also a recipient of the recognition as “2022 IEEE Open Journal of Instrumentation and Measurement Outstanding Reviewer” by the Instrumentation and Measurement Society.
She serves as VP of Publications of the IEEE Council of RFID. She serves as Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement and the IEEE Journal of Radio Frequency Identification. She also serves as Steering Committee Chair of the IEEE Journal of RFID and as Chair of the IEEE CRFID’s Technical Committee on Motion Capture and Localization (IEEE TC-MoCap). Moreover, she serves as Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Council of RFID for the period 2023-2025.
Dr. Buffi is a member of the IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Society, the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society and of the IEEE Council on RFID.