Body Area Networks (BANs) – An Overview with Smart Sensors based Telemedical Monitoring System

The wireless communication technology and its development have progressed a lot in various fields of study, but none so more than in the field of wireless networks. Among the various research areas and applications of this technology is BAN or Body Area Network, which can be defined as a miniature network consisting of sensors operating mainly on or around the human body. Technological advancements in devices with features like low cost, low size, ultra-low power consumption and emission, with more reliable communication expands the span of usage scenarios and applications especially in healthcare and monitoring. A health-care BAN application may comprise of sensors (wearable or implanted) and servers (personal and central). Such a network gives rise to two communication types categorized as Intra-BAN communication (sensors and personal device communication) and Inter-BAN (communication between servers). Classification of BANs on the basis of the device-operation environment can be divided in two main categories: wearable BANs and implanted BANs. These categories and their cooperation issues have particular importance since requirements of BANs change with the operating environment. This paper presents a comparison of wearable BANs with implanted BANs also covering the important issues mentioned, also identifying the differences between a normal Wireless Sensor Network and BAN. Furthermore, the paper also proposes human body communication to be utilized for BAN.