A wireless measuring system, consisting of sensors and transmission units, helps to keep livestock healthier with a minimum use of resources.

It’s bigger, it’s better and it’s longer, and it’s unique in the Australasian two-way radio world. It’s RadioComms Connect 2008, which is back for its second year and set to take the radio industry by storm when it comes to Melbourne in November.

A 10 kg GSM mobile phone network has been developed by European researchers to allow rescue workers to set up communications hours, or even minutes, after a man-made or natural catastrophe.

A marine wireless network has been developed by researchers at the University of Queensland to help manage the Great Barrier Reef and other sensitive environments.

A multi-year contract to supply Hong Kong international airport with up to 70 million RFID labels will see speedier and more reliable luggage handling for many of the 48 million passengers that use the airport each year.

Researchers have proved the viability of a new and as yet untapped radio frequency band which will increase the speed and capacity of data transfer to wireless devices like laptops and iPods, and potentially between a home DVD player and high-definition TV.

The RFID business value is expected to grow by five times in the next 10 years. The Active RFID business is growing by about 10 times, driven by the $475 million military order for Savi Technology and innovations such as the first 100,000 RFID labels from Power ID that have greatly enhanced range over alternatives.

A system capable of simultaneously measuring hundreds of RFID tags and rapidly testing new RFID tag prototypes has been designed by researchers.

A particular window of time when mobile signals and radio waves are ‘super strength’ — allowing them to be clearer and travel greater distances — has been discovered by Salil Gunashekar as part of his doctoral studies at the University of Leicester’s Department of Engineering in England.

Major changes to land mobile frequencies and modes of operation are up for consideration in two papers released by the ACMA (Australian Communications and Media Authority) just before its RadComms conference. The two discussion papers, ‘Spectrum Options: 403-520 MHz band’ and ‘Five-year Spectrum Outlook 2009-2014’ were of particular interest to many in the audience and came in for a good deal of discussion.

This look at what could happen in the future with radio services is taken from a presentation by Chris Chapman, ACMA chairman, when he addressed nearly 300 delegates at the RadComms conference in Melbourne.

Underground tunnels, usually a difficult environment for radios, can have a frequency 'sweet spot' at which signals may travel several times further than at other frequencies, according to researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), in the US.

Wireless sensors in embedded systems in devices from traffic lights to mobile phones, designed to create wireless communications networks automatically, could benefit a range of areas, including emergency management, security, helping vulnerable people to live independently, traffic control, warehouse management and environmental monitoring.

A new antenna structure that works in a wide range of frequencies has been presented by researchers from Carlos III University of Madrid (UC3M) in collaboration with the National Astronomical Observatory in Spain.

This is the second part of a multi-part series looking at various RF effects including sperm count, interruption of sleep patterns and brain tumours. Researchers at the Cleveland Clinic in America studied 361 men at their infertility clinic to investigate the effect of mobile phone use on semen quality.