Inter Body Coupling
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OPEN Inter‑body coupling
in electro‑quasistatic human
body communication: theory
and analysis o security
and intererence properties
Mayukh Nath1*, Shovan Maity1, Shitij Avlani1, Scott Weigand2 & Shreyas Sen1
Radiative communication using electromagnetic felds is the backbone o today’s wirelessly connected
world, which implies that the physical signals are available or malicious interceptors to snoop
within a 5–10 m distance, also increasing intererence and reducing channel capacity. Recently,
Electro‑quasistatic Human Body Communication (EQS‑HBC) was demonstrated which utilizes the
human body’s conductive properties to communicate without radiating the signals outside the body.
Previous experiments showed that an attack with an antenna was unsuccessul at a distance more
than 1 cm rom the body surace and 15 cm rom an EQS‑HBC device. However, since this is a new
communication modality, it calls or an investigation o new attack modalities—that can potentially
exploit the physics utilized in EQS‑HBC to break the system. In this study, we present a novel attack
method or EQS‑HBC devices, using the body o the attacker itsel as a coupling surace and capacitive
inter‑body coupling between the user and the attacker. We develop theoretical understanding backed
by experimental results or inter‑body coupling, as a unction o distance between the subjects. We
utilize this newly developed understanding to design EQS‑HBC transmitters that minimizes the attack
distance through inter‑body coupling, as well as the intererence among multiple EQS‑HBC users due
to inter‑body coupling. This understanding will allow us to develop more secure and robust EQS‑HBC
based body area networks in the uture.
Wireless communication using electromagnetic radiation has formed the base-bone for today’s ubiquitous con-
nected devices with a possibility of trillions of connected ‘things’—forming the ‘Internet of ings’ (IoT) revo-
lution. A portion of these IoT devices will be on, around or even inside the human body creating a network of
intelligent devices - namely the ‘Internet of Body’ (IoB). e distinguishing feature for IoB devices compared to
IoT devices is that IoB devices share a common medium - i.e. the body itself1.
Since traditional Body Area Network (BAN) devices operate through radiative communication such as Blue-
tooth, Med-Radio, WiFi etc, the physical signals are not only available on and around the user’s body, but also
broadcast away from the user—making it available for malicious interceptors within 5–10 m distance (Fig. 1c).
is brings us to the natural question: can the distinguished feature, i.e. the body as a common medium, be used
to improve the security of IoB devices?
Recently, Electro-Quasistatic Human Body Communication (EQS-HBC)2 was introduced as a “Physically
Secure” way to communicate among IoB devices using the body itself as a ‘wire’3. Unlike traditional WBAN
devices, frequencies used in EQS-HBC are low (< 1 MHz)—such that the corresponding wavelength is large
with respect to the human body, making the communication electro-quasistatic (EQS) in nature. EQS-HBC,
more specically capacitive EQS-HBC, uses the human body as a forward path in a circuit to transmit signal
between a transmitter and a receiver, and completes the communication path through parasitic capacitive cou-
pling formed between the EQS-HBC device’s oating ground and earth’s ground. As the human body—acting
as an electrically small antenna—does not radiate well in the EQS frequency regime, it makes the EQS-HBC
communication path analogous to a closed loop electrical circuit. As demonstrated by Das et al2—since far-eld
1
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, USA. 2Eli Lilly and Company,
Indianapolis, USA. *email: [email protected]
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Figure 1. Inter-body coupling in Electro-quasistatic region: (a) Interference in received EQS-HBC signal due
to inter-body coupling with other users. For multiple EQS-HBC users in close proximity, the received signal is
usable only if the interference signal is a few dB lower than the signal. (b) While EQS-HBC devices restrict EM
leakage within 10 cm of the user’s body, inter-body capacitive coupling can give rise to a new attack modality,
where the attacker’s body is used to capacitively couple to the user’s body, and the coupled signal is picked up
using an EQS-HBC receiver. (c) For devices that do not restrict EM leakage, such as Bluetooth or other WBAN
devices, the signal can be picked up by an attacking device with an antenna within 5–10 m of the user. e
human gures were created using the open-source soware ‘MakeHuman’12.
electromagnetic radiation of signal is prevented in EQS-HBC signal, the signal is restricted within 1 cm of the
body surface and 15 cm of an EQS-HBC device—making it physically secure.
However, one may raise a question, whether an E-eld probe or an antenna is indeed the best way to attack
or sni EQS-HBC communication. We motivate this discussion by considering the fact that EQS-HBC uses the
human body as medium, and asking the question: Is there any way two human bodies can couple, making EQS-
HBC signals available on a second person’s body? For Radiative communication protocols such as Bluetooth,
the signal propagation between a transmitters and receiver is well-understood, and can be estimated well using
the Friis Transmission Eq. 4:
( )n
PRx
∝ (1)
PTx d
where PRx and PTx are received power and transmitted power respectively and the path loss exponent n is deter-
mined by people and objects present in the signal path. e Friis equation provides a simple outlook on the
distance over which the signal from a radiative device can be picked up. For EQS-HBC systems however, a similar
understanding is required, especially in the electro-quasistatic region. Literature survey reveals studies that have
considered the human body as an antenna before, and these works fall under mainly two categories—one where
the Specic Absorption Rate (SAR) of the human body has been investigated over dierent frequencies5–7, and the
other, where the interference received by the human body for incident EM waves has been examined8,9. Kibret8,10
characterized antenna properties of the human body by modelling it as a monopole antenna in the 1–200 MHz
range. Li11 used the same approach to examine wireless signal transmission between two humans for frequencies
1–90 MHz. Unfortunately these studies do not directly correspond to EQS-HBC inter-body coupling—because
rstly, the frequency ranges explored in these works fall out of the low frequency EQS-HBC range (< 1 MHz )
and they deal with radiative communication that cannot be applied to EQS inter-body coupling. Secondly, these
studies do not use wearable devices as transmitters and receivers and hence the results from these studies cannot
be applied to EQS-HBC devices that use parasitic coupling between its oating ground and the earth’s ground
to close the loop of communication. A theory of human inter-body coupling in the context of EQS-HBC—to
the author’s best knowledge—has never been developed before. In this paper, we answer the question of a better
attack modality of EQS-HBC by developing, for the rst time, an understanding of inter-body coupling over a
broad frequency range (100 kHz–1 GHz) along with a detailed focus on the EQS region. We show that the human
body can function as a capacitor plate in the EQS region and an attack device connected to the attackers body
can potentially “sni ” EQS-HBC signals from a further distance, compared to an attack device connected to
an antenna (Fig. 1b). Using the developed theory and understandings of the physical principles, we propose an
improved EQS-HBC communication design that is tolerant of “Inter-Body Attack” as well as minimizes inter-
human interference (Fig. 1a), thus improving channel capacity.
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Figure 2. (a) Forward and return path for regular intra-body Electro-quasistatic Human Body communication
(EQS-HBC). Forward path is formed through the human body, while the return path is formed through
parasitic capacitances CG,Tx and CG,Rx with environment. (b) Weak Capacitive coupling between an EQS-HBC
user and an antenna, ensuring minimal leakage pick-up by that antenna. is implies minimal interference
and maximum security towards antenna based devices. (c) Strong capacitive coupling, CC between two human
bodies pose the question of inter-body signal leakage for EQS HBC. is can potentially allow the 2nd user,
the attacker, to sni EQS HBC signals from the 1st user. If the 2nd person is just a regular user of HBC, the
capacitive coupling can cause interference between the EQS HBC Signals from the two bodies. (d) Simplied
circuit model for regular intra-body HBC of Fig. 2a, and approximate expression for channel loss. (e) Simplied
circuit model for inter-body HBC or HBC leakage, from Fig. 2b, and approximate expression for channel loss.
e extra term CC /CBody represents an additional loss from inter-body coupling. (f) Comparison of inter-body
EQS coupling for capacitive vs Resistive load at the receiver’s end. For capacitive load, the low-frequency region
is a at-band response. For resistive load, the response is a 20 dB/decade rising slope.
EQS inter‑body coupling. In capacitive EQS-HBC, signal electrodes of the transmitting and receiving
devices are connected to a human body, while the ground electrodes are le oating. As shown in Fig. 2a, the
human body forms the forward path of communication13, while the return path is formed by parasitic capaci-
tance between the earth’s ground and the transmitter and receiver ground planes14 (CG,Tx and CG,Rx respectively).
is parasitic return path is key in capacitive EQS-HBC operation, as low-frequency EQS operation makes the
system analogous to an electrical circuit (2d)—where a closed loop must be present between the transmitter
and the receiver. e impedance of the return path capacitances are much higher compared to the forward path
resistance RB for frequencies < 1 MHz14,15, and when operated in that frequency region, most of the potential
drop happens across CG,Tx and CG,Rx . e fact that wavelength of signals are much larger than the human body
dimensions, leaves the entire human body roughly at the same quasistatic electric potential—letting us incorpo-
rate the body as a single point node in the circuit model and introduce the idea of inter-body coupling simply
in terms of a lumped version of a distributed coupling capacitance CC , as shown in g. 2c. As the primary EQS-
HBC user’s body stays at a constant EQS potential at a given point in time, this inter-body capacitance CC can
couple part of that potential to a second person’s body, and can potentially be picked up by an EQS-HBC device
being used by the same person. is inter-body coupling can aect EQS-HBC in two dierent ways, namely
security and interference:
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Security perspective: New attack modality with the human body as a capacitor plate. As we already mentioned,
physical security of EQS-HBC has been demonstrated2 using E-eld probes or standard RF antennas to pick up
signal leakage from an HBC user. However, these probes and antennas are inecient at the low frequency range
of EQS HBC. For example, for an operating frequency of 100 kHz, an ecient mono-pole antenna will have to
have a length of 750 m, which is completely impractical. However, in these low frequency range, these ’antennas’
can also pick up signal by capacitively coupling to the body of an EQS-HBC user. Now, typical electrical antennas
tend to have a very small surface area, thus forming an inecient capacitive coupling. Ideally, an electrode with
a huge surface area should be able form a much better capacitive coupling with the body of an EQS-HBC user,
and one of the easiest movable semi-oating large surface area available to an attacker is his or her own body itself.
Fig. 1b, illustrates a probable attack scenario where a naive attacker with an antenna placed more than 15 cm
away from an EQS-HBC user is unable to snoop the signal, whereas an informed attacker with an EQS-HBC
receiver successfully does the same by using her body as a capacitive coupler and staying at a longer distance—as
long as the coupling is strong enough to provide enough signal at the snooping device—and thus potentially
breaks the physical security of EQS-HBC using this novel ‘Inter-Body Attack’.
Interference perspective: Proximity between multiple EQS-HBC users and impact on SIR. Inter-body capacitive
coupling for EQS-HBC also poses the problem of interference between multiple HBC users in close proximity,
where the signal from one user’s body can interfere with that on the other user’s body. As illustrated in Fig. 1a, for
N number of additional EQS-HBC users with the ith person at a distance di from the user under consideration,
the signal to interference ratio (SIR) at that user’s body will be given by:
VSiguser VSiguser
SIR =
Vintf
= ∑N (2)
i=1 Sigi × Coupling(di )
V
where Coupling(di ) is the inter-body coupling coecient between the user under consideration, and ith interfer-
ing person. is coecient is the additional loss introduced in the EQS-HBC channel path due to the physical
separation of two human bodies and would be equal to 1 if the two bodies were one and the same. Functional
form of Coupling(di ) is derived later in the paper as Eq. (6). For a given signal level VSiguser on the desired user’s
body, Eq. (2) should be used to determine how many other EQS-HBC users (quantied by N) utilizing the same
frequency band could be tolerated in close proximity to that user. e number N in this case is to be determined
based on specic use cases, e.g. number of EQS-HBC users inside an elevator, number of EQS-HBC users in a
conference room, number of users within a xed radius of someone etc.
Results
We have motivated the fact that the coupling between two bodies in the EQS regime is dictated by the inter-body
coupling capacitance, CC . In the following sections, we provide a detailed account of EQS inter-body coupling,
starting with a biophysical model of EQS-HBC and extending the same to incorporate capacitive coupling
between two human bodies. Further, to understand the continuity from EQS to EM and the boundaries of
EQS operation, we discuss forms of coupling other than EQS as well—over dierent frequency ranges going
up to 1 GHz - where these devices behave as radiative devices instead. e theory and hypotheses described in
the following section has been developed in tandem with rigorous simulations and measurements that we will
discuss separately in later parts of the paper for better readability. Finally, utilizing this newfound understand-
ing, we will propose EQS-HBC device design strategies to minimize the security and interference risks of EQS
inter-body coupling.
Dierent requency regions o inter‑body coupling. Region 1: Electro-quasistatic coupling. is
region applies to frequencies less than 1 MHz, where human body dimensions are small compared to the wave-
length (Fig. 4a). As mentioned before, compared to many commercial antenna designs, the human body has
a large surface area. Naturally, this can introduce a capacitive coupling between two human subjects present
close to each other. In fact, this phenomenon can be demonstrated through a simple EM simulation in ANSYS
HFSS—using a simplied crossed-cylinder model with dielectric and conductive properties of muscle and skin
(Fig. 3a) to represent a human subject. When an EQS-HBC transmitter operating at 500 kHz is attached to one
of the subjects, the electric eld leaked through the body surface can be seen in Fig. 3b. When the bodies are re-
moved from the simulation and the EQS-HBC transmitter is le hanging in air, the leaked E eld is signicantly
lower and localized around the transmitter (Fig. 3c). is clearly demonstrates a high leakage of quasistatic E
Field due to higher surface area of the body, and enables visualizing the two bodies as two ends of a capacitor. By
modelling this inter-body coupling as a lumped capacitor CC , and extending a simplied version of the capaci-
tive HBC biophysical model developed by Maity et al15(Fig. 2d) into a two human model, a basic circuit theoretic
analysis can be performed. e resulting biophysical model for inter-body coupling is presented as the circuit in
Fig. 2e. ere, CBody is the capacitance of the body surface to earth’s ground and RBody is the body tissue resist-
ance. Typical experimental value of CBody is known to be around 150 pF15. RBody is in the order of 1 kΩ at low
frequencies and its value typically reduces with increasing frequency15,16. e inter-body coupling capacitance
CC would depend on the body surface area of the two human subjects and the distance between them—a plot of
typical CC with respect to distance is shown later in the paper in Fig. 8a. As an example, for two 1.8 m tall humans
standing 1 m apart, CC can be estimated to be around 20 pF. Two distinct cases of the EQS coupling region are
of interest, depending on the load impedance ZL used at the receiver side—a low resistance load, typically 50 ,
and a capacitive load.
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Figure 3. (a) Simulation model used in ANSYS HFSS to demonstrate leakage of quasistatic E eld through
the surface of the human body. e EQS-HBC transmitter on subject 1 is operated at 500 kHz, with a voltage
amplitude of 1V. (b) Leakage of E eld when the bodies are present. High surface area of the body causes a
higher leakage between the bodies. (c) Leakage of E eld in the absence of the bodies. e leaked E eld is much
more conned and localised around the transmitter.
• Resistive Load: (ZL = RL) For many standard RF devices, use of a 50 source and load impedance is the
norm. is section explores the transfer characteristics assuming a pure capacitive coupling between two
human bodies. e circuit model corresponding to this case can be obtained by replacing ZL by RL = 50
in Fig. 2d. e coupling capacitance CC and the load resistance RL together forms a high pass lter, and the
pole of the lter depends on the exact coupling capacitance CC present between two human subjects, given
a xed load resistance RL . is causes a 20 dB/decade rising slope in the channel gain versus frequency plot,
until at higher frequencies - where the eect of a low pass lter formed by the source resistance RS and the
body shunt-capacitance, CBody is encountered. e resulting response from circuit simulations can be seen
in Fig. 2e.
• Capacitive load: ( ZL = 1/ωCL ) For capacitive HBC, it has been suggested by Maity et al, that a capacitive
load is a more viable option compared to a 50 load, as it provides a at-band frequency response in the
low frequency. Now assuming the same receiver being present on a second subject, it should be interesting
to see how much of the signal from the transmitting subject couples to the receiving subject. Simulating the
circuit (Fig. 2d) from this modality, shows a similar at-band response in the low-frequency region, as shown
in Fig. 2e. A capacitive division is formed between the the coupling capacitance CC and the eective receiver
side capacitance Ceff ,Rx = CBody + (CL ||CG,Rx ). is capacitive division is independent of frequency, giving
rise to the aforementioned at band frequency response. e inter-body channel transfer for this at band
range can be calculated to be:
Vo CG,Tx CC CG,Rx
Vi
≈
CBody CBody CL (3)
For frequencies above 100 MHz, a low pass eect is seen because of RB and Ctot = CC ||Ceff ,Rx.
Note that the plot shown in Fig. 2f is from a circuit simulation, assuming a lumped element model of Fig. 2e.
Of course, this modelling only makes sense in the EQS region (f < 1 MHz ); the higher frequency regions will
be explored in the following sections. In the EQS region, a capacitive load ( ZL = 1/ωCL ) clearly results into
a consistently higher received voltage due to it’s at frequency response—as opposed to a 20 dB/decade rising
slope for the resistive load ( ZL = 50). Further, if a regular small antenna instead of a second human body is
used as a coupler at the receiver (Fig. 2b), the coupling capacitance CC would signicantly drop—resulting into
a much poor received voltage. In short, in the EQS region,
VRx, Antenna Coupled ≪ VRx, Body Coupled, RL ≪ VRx, Body Coupled, CL (4)
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Figure 4. Inter-body coupling modes for Capacitive HBC users: (a) EQS Region, f < 1 MHz, capacitive
coupling dominates. (b) 1 MHz < f < 10 MHz, body starts to act as a small monopole antenna, giving a 40dB/
decade rising response in coupling. (c) 10 MHz < f < 100 MHz, wavelength comparable to body dimensions;
Body-antenna resonance peaks occur. (d) f > 100 MHz, wavelength comparable to device dimensions; the
devices start coupling through EM leakage. (e) e trend of maximum distance, over which signals from
inter-body coupling can be detected (for a xed SNR at the transmitter), over frequency. e distance limit is
low independent of frequency for EQS coupling, increases rapidly once the two bodies start becoming ecient
antennas, and becomes saturates once the devices become ecient antennas themselves.
So if an attacker wants to device a strategy to snoop on an EQS-HBC device, the most eective strategy for
them would be to use human body coupling, with an EQS-HBC receiver with a capacitive load. Hence, this is
the attack modality that we will consider while suggesting design considerations for preventing snooping and
interference. But prior to that, let us also briey explore the higher frequency regions - to form an intuition about
the evolution of inter-body coupling over a broader frequency range.
Region 2: Inter-body electromagnetic coupling. Since the human body is made with conductive tissues, it is
possible to look at a standing human subject as a cylinder, made with a weak conductor. As shown in g. 4b,
a human subject standing on the earth’s ground can be seen as a monopole antenna. at being said, it should
also be noted that unlike an antenna—where signal is measured between the antenna conductor and earth’s
ground—in HBC, signal is measured between the body and a small oating ground. So concepts of antenna
transmission may not directly apply to inter-body coupling in this case. Parts of the concepts presented in this
section were developed through FEM simulations in ANSYS HFSS, discussed in detail in a later section. Based
on the simulation results of HBC inter-body coupling in Fig. 5b, we will sub-divide the inter-body EM coupling
region into two sections, as described below:
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• Region 2a: Electrically small monopole: At low frequencies ( f < 10MHz ), wavelength of the incident
wave is large compared to the height h of the subject (Fig. 4b). For that reason, the body can be thought of
as an electrically small monopole at these frequencies. Now the radiation resistance of an electrically small
monopole antenna of length l is given by4,
Rrad = 80π 2 (l/)2 (5)
Such that, the gain of the antenna is proportional to square of the frequency—GRx ∝ f 2. So when the received
power by the body is plotted in dB vs frequency, we should see a 20 dB/decade positive slope. is behavior
will be apparent in the EM simulation results discussed in the following sections. Note that when we will
look at the coupling between two human subjects (Fig. 5), one of the human bodies will act as a transmitting
“antenna”, while the second as a receiving “antenna”. So, the net gain at the receiver will be proportional to
f 4 , giving rise to a 40 dB/decade slope in the gain vs frequency plot.
• Region 2b: Body resonance peaks: For 10MHz < f < 100MHz , the body dimensions become comparable to
wavelength. As a result, antenna resonance peaks occur, as represented in Fig. 4c. e exact position and
nature of the peaks will depend on the height and posture of the subjects. A detailed analysis of the position
and nature of the peaks in this region would be interesting - and while out of scope for the current paper,
will be part of our future work.
Region 3: Electromagnetic coupling between devices/electrodes. e electrodes of an HBC device that is used
to couple HBC signal to a subject’s body, are typically watch shaped, with a diameter of 3–5 cm. At frequencies
> 100 MHz , these electrodes start becoming ecient antennas themselves (Fig. 4d)—peaking in the GHz range
- depending on exact dimensions. As an example, if an electrode of diameter 5 cm is approximated as a mono-
pole antenna of the same length, the resonant peak of the antenna occurs at 1.5 GHz in the air. In this region,
the “human” part of HBC remains no longer relevant, and the communication becomes a weak form of regular
wireless transmission.
Summary: Trend of maximum distance for inter-body coupling. A limit of inter-body coupling distance can
be conceptualized for a minimum signal to noise ratio (SNR) at the receiver for its functionality. If we focus on
the capacitive HBC devices, a trend of this distance limit can be drawn (Fig. 4e) for a xed signal level on the
transmitting subject’s body. For EQS Region, since the frequency response is at, the limiting distance is inde-
pendent over frequency. As the body starts to become an ecient antenna, the limiting distance rises. Finally,
when the devices themselves become ecient antenna, the limiting distance becomes at again. e EQS region
has the lowest inter-body coupling distance limit, in all three regions. In other words, given a choice of operating
frequency, EQS frequency region should oer the most security against inter body coupling. is will become
apparent from our simulation (Fig. 5b) and experiment (Fig. 6b) results in the following sections, where the
gap between on-body or intra-body signal, and inter-body coupled signal is found to be maximum in the EQS
region, and reduces in the higher frequency regions.
Results rom FEM simulations and experiments. So far, we have discussed the dierent modalities
through which signal transfer could happen between two human subjects wearing an HBC transmitter and
receiver respectively. In a real-world scenario, all these eects are present simultaneously, and depending on the
region in the frequency spectrum, one of these can become dominant. We show results from EM simulations
as well as experiments in this section to demonstrate this very fact. For simulations, ANSYS HFSS—an FEM
based Maxwell’s equations solver is used. A simplied human body structure is assumed as shown in g. 5a.
Additional details about both the EM simulation setup and experiment setup can be found later in the Methods
section.
HFSS simulation for frequency dependent inter-body coupling transfer characteristics. Two subjects are kept at a
distance of 1m from each other, with capacitive HBC device models on stretched arms. Simulation is performed
over the frequency range of 100 kHz–1 GHz, for both capacitive and 50 termination at the receiving sub-
ject’s device. e resulting transfer characteristics is shown in Fig. 5b. Evidently this transfer characteristics can
broadly be divided into three regions, depending on the dominant modality of coupling in operation:
• Freq < 1 MHz: In this region, we see a 20dB/decade rising slope for the 50 termination, and a at band
response for the capacitive termination. is indicates that the dominant coupling method in this frequency
range is electro-quasistatic, and hence can be modeled by circuit models shown in Fig. 2c
• Freq 1 MHz–100 MHz: In this region for the 50 termination, we see a 40 dB/decade rising slope that attens
into peaks between 20 and 80 MHz. is indicates electromagnetic/ mono-pole antenna coupling between
the two subjects. For capacitive termination, we see an increased response from the at-band in the lower
frequency range and peaks at similar frequencies as the 50 termination. e slope is less than 40 dB/decade
however - this indicates that both EQS and EM eects are equally present in this case—the EQS eect being
a at-band response at − 80 dB, while the EM eect being a 40 dB/decade rising slope. When the two eects
are added, a gentler rising slope results - and the peaks from the EM eect show up at a higher level (lower
loss) compared to the 50 termination.
• Freq > 100 MHz: In this frequency range, we see a sharp rise in the transfer characteristics, due to the elec-
trodes becoming ecient antennas. is becomes the dominant mode of transfer, as in the GHz frequency
range, the human body becomes an inecient antenna. Its resonant frequency as a mono-pole antenna lies in
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Figure 5. (a) Simulation setup used in ANSYS HFSS, using simplied models for the human body, and single-
ended/ capacitive HBC electrodes as transmitter and receivers. Setup represents measurements in open-area. (b)
Results from open-area simulation in HFSS. ree distinct regions are clearly visible, electro-quasistatic (EQS)
region for freq< 1 MHz, EM region for freq 1 MHz–100 MHz and device coupling region for freq> 100 MHz.
(c) Simulation setup for results in Anechoic Chamber. e subjects are enclosed in a metal-cage to represent
higher return-path coupling in EQS region. is simulation setup is used to validate experimental results from
EQS region in the anechoic chamber. (d) HFSS simulation results, inside anechoic chamber. e EQS region of
the inter-body responses, are 10 dB higher compared to open air simulation results in 5b. Because of this, the
transition point between EQS region and EM region moves right.
the 20–80 MHz range, and the response starts dropping as the frequency is increased beyond that, as shown
in Fig. 5b. Transfer of signal by EQS capacitive coupling between the two subjects also becomes inecient due
to the previously discussed low-pass eect (Fig. 2e). So in the high frequency range (> 100 MHz ), a sning
device that has a relatively small form-factor, like a hand-held antenna, can pick up leakage signal from an
HBC device eciently. Also note that the dierence between intra-body and inter-body signal levels in this
region is much lower compared to the at 10-20 dB dierence in the EQS region of f < 1MHz . is pretty
much renders this frequency region unsafe for operating HBC devices, reiterating the importance of EQS
region in HBC—and the focus of the current paper.
Experiments. To validate the simulation results, we perform experimental channel loss measurements between
two human subjects—with the rst set of experiments performed inside an anechoic chamber for clean results,
free from external interference. e subjects are kept at a distance of 1 m, and a frequency sweep at the transmit-
ter is performed from 100 kHz to 960 MHz. We use handheld devices for our measurements as opposed to wall
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Figure 6. (a) Measurement setup in open-area. e subjects are kept at a distance of 1m for frequency sweep
measurements. (b) Experiment results from open-area measurements. Multiple transmitting devices are used to
cover the whole frequency range, as shown later in Fig. 9a. (c) Measurement setup inside anechoic chamber. (d)
Results from measurements inside the anechoic chamber.
connected devices, as wall connected devices share a common ground, and would hence reduce the channel
loss and produce an inaccurate result. Now to cover the entire frequency range of our experiments, we split the
range into multiple handheld RF generators—details of which can be found in the Methods section. Note that
the ground sizes of the dierent transmitting devices are slightly dierent, and that in turn makes the transmitter
side return path capacitance, CG,Tx slightly dierent between the devices. As a result, there are slight discontinui-
ties in the plot of the measurement data, in Fig. 6b and 6d. However, we made sure to minimize these disconti-
nuities through a rigorous calibration protocol, described later in the methods section.
While performing the experiments inside the anechoic chamber (Fig. 6c) provides a controlled low-noise
environment for gathering accurate frequency response, the chamber is enclosed in a grounded metal cage and
that aects the low frequency EQS region of the results. First, the grounded metal cage increases the overall return
path capacitance, and that reduces channel loss. Second, as the EQS region now shows lower loss, the crossover
point between the EQS and EM regions moves to a higher frequency. e chamber used for our experiments
is rated to eciently absorb incident EM waves above 80 MHz; so the results from anechoic chamber can be
correlated with the HFSS open air simulations only above 80 MHz. To reproduce the anechoic chamber condi-
tions in the low frequency EQS range, a second set of simulations are performed where the anechoic chamber
is modelled as a metal cage (Fig. 5c). e results from that simulation—shown in Fig. 5d—show an improved
correspondence in the EQS range with experiment results in anechoic chamber (Fig. 6d). Anechoic chamber
measurements (Fig. 6d) show a 10 dB reduction in inter-body coupling loss in the EQS region compared to
open-air simulation results in Fig. 5b. Also, the cross-over point between EM and EQS region moves close to
10 MHz, as opposed to 1 MHz in Fig. 5b.
e experimental measurements are also repeated in an open area (Fig. 6a) to eliminate the eect of a metal
enclosure in the results. Environmental RF noise presents a challenge in open area measurements however - espe-
cially for the 50 receiver load case in the low frequency region. We present an averaged data for the capacitive
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Frequency (MHz) Field Strength (µV/m) Measurement Distance (m)
0.009–0.490 2400/F (kHz) 300
0.490–1.705 24000/F (kHz) 30
1.705–30.0 30 30
30–88 100 3
88–216 150 3
216–960 200 3
Above 960 500 3
Table 1. FCC eld limit regulations for unintentional radiators17.
Figure 7. (a) Electric eld decay from an EQS HBC device in a 2-D cross section at 500 kHz. (b) Plot of E-eld
decay vs distance shows that the E-Field drops 20000x below the FCC threshold to qualify as an unintentional
radiator. is seconds the weak capacitive coupling demonstrated in Fig. 2b.
load cases over multiple measurements in Fig. 6b. e measurement data reproduces the 20 dB dierence between
intra-body and inter-body signal level in the at EQS region, as seen earlier in simulations (Fig. 5b).
From our earlier example in the anechoic chamber, we saw that intra-body and inter-body losses are 60 dB and
70 dB respectively. Since the anechoic chamber provides a strong return path, this was an optimistic estimate for
inter-body channel loss. On the other hand, a pessimistic estimate of the channel loss comes from the open-air
case, where the inter-body loss is about 80 dB. So even at 1 m distance between the two bodies, the dierence
between intra-body and inter-body channel loss lies between 10 and 20 dB.
FCC regulations: Can EQS‑HBC device be classifed as an unintentional radiator? In the previ-
ous section we have looked into the inter-body coupling among humans when they are using EQS-HBC as BAN
communication. is coupling depends on the Electric elds created by the EQS HBC User and the surface area
of the recipient. Related to the phenomena of electric elds around the human body during EQS HBC trans-
mission, an important question arises about the usability of these devices in practice: Can EQS-HBC Device be
classied as an Unintentional Radiator?
According to FCC regulations17 as shown in Table 1, the denition of intentional vs unintentional radiator
is as follows: for a frequency F between 9 and 490 kHz, if the elds at 300 m distance are below 2400/F and
for a for a frequency F between 490 kHz and 1.705 MHz, if the elds at 30 m distance are below 24000/F, the
device can be classied as an unintentional radiator—which means no additional FCC certication would be
required for deployment of these devices in practice. Using our developed model, we can get a great sense of
the “radiated” electric elds in EQS-HBC. In Fig. 7a, electric eld emission from a human body with an active
EQS-HBC transmitter is visualized. From the decay of the eld vs distance plotted in Fig. 7b, it can be seen that
at 30 m distance, the electric eld is about 20000 times lower than the required FCC limit (Table 1). So, the elds
emanated from the EQS-HBC devices are low—and is not perceptible by other devices as per FCC standards.
Hence EQS-HBC devices can be classied as unintentional radiators, and can be deployed without the need for
new standards and certications.
EQS‑HBC design consideration to maximally protect against inter‑body attack and interer‑
ence. We have shown the dierent regimes of inter-body coupling in HBC. More specically, for EQS-HBC
(f < 1 MHz ), inter- body transfer characteristics show a at band response similar to intra-body HBC, given a
capacitive load is used at the receiving device. e dierence in the channel loss between these two cases deter-
mines whether a successful attack can be performed using the human body as a capacitive coupler. By comparing
the equations shown in Fig. 2d,e, the dierence in channel loss between these two cases—or the coupling coef-
cient Coupling(d) from Eq. (2)—can be given by:
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Figure 8. (a) Inter-body coupling capacitance (CC ) with distance, obtained from simulating the model shown
in Fig. 5a with varying inter-body distances in ANSYS Maxwell. (b) SNR at a snooping device, for a given SNR
at the intended receiving device. When the SNR at the snooping device falls below 6–9 dB, successful attack is
prevented.
Minimum SNR (dB)
Intended BER PAM 2 (OOK) QPSK 16-QAM
10−2 4.3 1.2 9.6
10−3 6.8 5.3 11.9
10−4 8.4 7.1 13.2
Table 2. Minimum SNR required for operating at three dierent intended uncoded bit error rate (BER) in the
cases of PAM 2, QPSK and 16-QAM modulation techniques18.
VInter−body (d) CC (d)
Coupling(d) = = (6)
VIntra−body CBody
where d is the distance between the EQS-HBC user and the attacker’s body. Since the body to ground capacitance
CBody is xed at around 150 pF15, variation of the inter-body coupling capacitance CC with d will determine the
variation of VInter−body with d. Figure 8a shows a plot of CC vs d, obtained by electrostatic FEM simulation in
ANSYS Maxwell. Accordingly, putting CC = 21pF for d = 1 m in Eq. (6), we nd an additional loss of 17 dB for
inter-body coupling. is matches with our previous experimental nding, where we saw that at 1 m distance,
the dierence between intra-body and inter-body channel loss was in the range of 10–20 dB. At 5 m, CC reduces
to 6.6 pF, which raises this dierence to 27 dB.
Now, let us consider the example of EQS-HBC using On-O Keying (OOK) signals19,20, also known as PAM-2
modulation and target a coded bit error rate (BER) in the range of 10−6–10−8. is would imply an uncoded
BER of about 10−3 and set the minimum signal to noise ratio (SNR) requirement at about 6–7 dB18. So to ensure
proper functionality of intra-body EQS-HBC communication with this specic modulation and BER criteria,
transmitter power should be kept 6–9 dB greater than the receiver sensitivity including intra-body channel loss.
We can then calculate the additional loss for inter-body coupling using Eq. (6) and CC from Fig. 8a. is enables
us to estimate the SNR at the snooping person’s receiver for any pre-determined SNR at the intended receiver on
the EQS-HBC user’s body. is is plotted in Fig. 8b for a set of given SNR at the intended receiver. e shaded
“safe zone” is set below an SNR of 5 dB, due to the minimum 6–7 dB SNR requirement for this specic example.
By staying in the shaded region in the plot, a successful attack can be prevented. For example, if the signal level
of the EQS-HBC transmitter is set to maintain an SNR of 10 dB at the intended receiver, an attacker will not be
able to snoop that signal even at 10 cm distance from the user.
is approach of setting the transmitter signal level can easily be generalized for any modulation scheme and
targeted BER, by referencing the corresponding BER/SNR data. Table 2 lists SNR requirements for a couple of fre-
quently used modulation schemes for dierent targeted uncoded BER. By modifying the upper limit of the “safe
zone” in Fig. 8b according to the minimum SNR requirement from Table 2 or otherwise, a designer can make an
informed choice regarding the signal level of an EQS-HBC transmitter. Further, by setting the signal level in this
way, interference eects are also reduced between multiple adjacent EQS-HBC users in a common space. So even
if inter-body coupling in EQS-HBC introduces a risk of unintended signal sning and/or interference, steps can
be taken towards setting the signal level of an HBC device to minimize or eliminate the possibility of the same.
Additionally, we would like to comment that the design method proposed above is meant to be used for
determining an optimal static power of an EQS-HBC system. A static power based EQS-HBC system is viable
because unlike wireless systems, channel variability in EQS-HBC is primarily dependent on the transmitter and
receiver sizes and much less on specic on-body locations of the transmitter and the receiver14. is in turn
conveniently makes the communication safe from a pulsed interference attack, that could have potentially stolen
data from an adaptive power based system. For a static power based system, this kind of attack would only cause
jamming or denial of service, without the risk of data the.
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Conclusion
In conclusion, we show that the human body can function as a capacitive coupler to pick up EQS-HBC signals,
making this BAN technique vulnerable to inter-body attack and interference. We explore inter-body coupling
modalities over a broad frequency range (100 KHz–1 GHz). We identify and explain three distinct regions—
namely EQS inter-body coupling, inter-body EM coupling and inter-device EM coupling. We postulate a bio-
physical model that describes inter-body coupling in the EQS frequency region (< 1 MHz ) as a function of the
capacitance between two human bodies, which in turn is a function of distance. Finally, we demonstrate that
by optimizing the signal level at a EQS-HBC transmitting device, the inter-body coupling vulnerabilities can be
reduced (if not eliminated) to a distance of less than 10 cm of an EQS-HBC user’s body, restoring the physical
security of EQS-HBC.
Methods
is section contains details regarding our simulation and experimental methods, to facilitate reproduction of
the results if anyone wishes to do so.
EM simulation setup. All the EM simulations have been performed in Anso HFSS, which is a Finite
Element Methods based Maxwell Equation solver. A simple crossed cylinder model is used in place of a human
body for simplicity and fast simulations. A detailed model consisting of dierent human tissue parts is also used
to validate the simple model’s accuracy. Dielectric properties of all body tissues have been taken from the works
of Gabriel et al16.
Simple crossed cylinder model. A simple model is created using two perpendicular cylinders, as shown in
Fig. 5a, representing the torso and extended arms. e radius of the cylinders are 14 cm and 6 cm respectively.
e height of torso is taken to be 180 cm, and the entire arm span is taken to be 180 cm as well. Both the torso
and the arms are divided into a 4 mm outer shell of skin, and an interior of muscle. is crossed-cylinder model
is oated 2 cm above a plane with Perfect E Boundary in HFSS—supposed to replicated an innite ground plane
or the earth’s ground. A rubber cylinder of same diameter as the torso is placed between the torso and the perfect
E plane. e entire model is then enclosed in a region of air, measuring 120 cm times 60 cm times 340 cm. Excita-
tion for the simulation is provided through capacitive coupling, as described in the next sub-section.
Excitation. A capacitive coupling model is used to provide excitation to the body attached to a transmitter. e
coupler consists of two copper discs with a radius of 2.5 cm. One of the discs, is 2 mm thick and is curved onto
the arm—this disc replicated an electrode patch attached to the arm. e other disc with a thickness of 5 mm,
replicates the ground plane of an wearable watch-like HBC device. the separation between the two plates can be
varied to change the capacitance between the plates, a distance of 3 cm is used in our simulations, yielding an
approximate parallel plate capacitance of 0.6 pF. Alternatively, a xed capacitance of choice can be maintained
between the plates, using a lumped RLC boundary in HFSS. A voltage source excitation is placed between the
two plates. In HFSS, this imparts an alternating potential dierence of amplitude 1 V between the two plates,
replicating an ideal AC voltage source. is is unlike the lumped port excitation method in HFSS, which is ideal
for 50 matched excitations, but may give rise to unexpected reections when coupling to a non-standard RF
model.
Measuring voltage at receiver. e receiving node structure is almost identical to that of the transmitter, with
parallel discs of similar dimensions. A lumped RLC boundary is placed between the electrode and the ground
plate at the receiver, which is set to 50 for a low impedance termination, and 1 pF for capacitive high imped-
ance termination cases. e potential dierence between the plates is calculated by integrating the electric eld
along a straight line between the electrode and ground plates. Note that for capacitive termination, the size and
shape of the receiver ground plate controls the ratio CG,Rx /CL in Eq. (3). To maintain a fast simulation time,
we refrained from modelling the exact experimental receiver in detail and stayed with the simpler parallel disc
structure. is however makes both CG,Rx and CL dierent from that in the experimental setup and we found
that articially setting CL = 1 pF in the simulation restores the CG,Rx /CL ratio to yield results comparable to the
experiments. Increasing or decreasing the value of CL would result into a decrease and increase respectively of
the level of the EQS at-band in Fig. 5b,d.
Calculating inter-body coupling capacitance (CC). e distance dependent inter-body coupling capacitance
CC (d) is calculated by simulations in ANSYS Maxwell, which is an FEM based static Maxwell’s Equations solver.
Simulations are performed in Maxwell’s electrostatic mode. e same two person cross-cylinder model as shown
in Fig. 5a is used here as well, and the capacitance matrix between the two bodies is calculated by assuming the
individual bodies as individual conducting objects. e distance between the two bodies is varied to obtain CC
as a function of d, and the resulting plot is shown in Fig. 8a.
e case for a detailed model. As the reader might have noted, all the EM simulations presented in this paper
has been performed with a simplied crossed cylinder model of the human body that only includes skin and
muscle. is may appear as an oversimplication. However, we did validate the simple model by comparing
the elds and currents in and around the model to that of a more detailed model, specically VHP Female v2.2
from Neva Electromagnetics21. In fact, a previous work by Maity et al22 performed this comparison in detail and
showed that the eld distributions inside and outside the model and received signals are similar between the
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Figure 9. Devices used for experiments: (a) Transmitting devices: Velleman Handheld RF Generator for
freq< 1 MHz, signal generator built using a Tiva C Launchpad Board for freq 1MHz–20MHz and RF Explorer
Handheld RF generator for freq> 24 MHz. (b) RF Explorer Handheld spectrum analyzer used as a receiving
device, and a high-frequency buer used for high impedance/capacitive load measurements. (c) Couplers used
to connect the transmitter and receiver devices to body.
simple and complex model cases. Intuitively this makes sense when we look at the electrical properties of dier-
ent tissues on the body16—dielectric permittivity of most human tissues (except blood) are orders of magnitude
higher than that of the air, and most of them exhibit a low yet non-negligible conductivity. So when contrasted
with air that has a relative permittivity of 1 and zero conductivity, the body largely behaves like a homogeneous
mass of high dielectric permittivity and low but positive conductivity—in the context of electromagnetic elds.
And since HBC devices discussed in this paper operate at the interface of air and the body, the same simplica-
tion holds true. is makes the simple crossed cylinder model yield meaningful results without any loss of gen-
erality and reduces computational complexity and time by orders of magnitude—letting us perform simulations
over multiple frequencies and congurations.
Experimental setup. Experiments are conducted in two parts—the rst set of measurements are made
inside an EM anechoic chamber to maintain a controlled environment and achieve noise immunity. e second
sets of experiment are done in an open area such as an empty parking lot, to compare signal levels with the ones
inside anechoic chamber. For the purpose of replicating real-world HBC devices, hand-held transmitting and
receiving devices are used, as opposed to wall connected such as a Vector Network Analyzer. Wall connected
devices essentially share a common ground and bring the ground planes of the transmitter and receiver at a com-
mon potential, thus showing a lower loss and giving an optimistic channel transfer characteristics14,15.
Transmitting devices. We plot the transfer characteristics over a large frequency range, namely 100kHz–1GHz.
We use multiple handheld RF signal generators (Fig. 9a) to cover the entire range:
• Freq < 1 MHz A hand-held signal generator from Velleman is used to generate sinusoidal signal for frequen-
cies lower than 1 MHz.
• Freq 1 MHz–20 MHz An in-house signal generator is used, built using a Texas Instruments Tiva C Launchpad
evaluation board. e generator provides a square wave, the fundamental harmonic is used for our experi-
ments.
• Freq > 24 MHz RF explorer handheld RF generator is used, which generates sine wave in the range
24 MHz–6 GHz
All the transmitting devices are characterized using a precision spectrum analyzer, to record accurate transmit-
ting power of the fundamental at each frequency point. e power of the transmitting devices are controlled
such that the peak-to-peak voltage applied to the body stays around 2–4 V. As shown previously by Maity et al22,
this ensures that the elds and current densities inside the body stay well within the limits of safety mandated by
ICNIRP standards23. e experimental protocols involving human subjects have been approved by the Purdue
Institutional Review Board (IRB Protocol #1610018370). All guidelines and regulations, as given by the Purdue
IRB were followed during the experiments. Informed consent was obtained from all the participants for the
experiments.
Receiving devices. We use a handheld spectrum analyzer from RF Explorer that covers 50 kHz–960 MHz. e
range is adjusted for each frequency point measurement, to include only the fundamental peak, and the peak
power is noted. Subtracting the characterized transmitter power from this received power provides the channel
transfer gain at that frequency. For measuring the 50 termination cases, the spectrum analyzer is directly con-
nected to the HBC coupler, as the device has an input impedance of 50 . For capacitive load measurements,
a high-frequency buer is connected to the HBC coupler rst, and the buer’s output is given to the spectrum
analyzer. e buer board, shown in Fig. 9b, is made using BUF602, a high speed buer from Texas Instruments.
e board is congured to have an input resistance of 1 M. Ideally this would just make the input impedance
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of the receiver as 1 M resistive. However, in reality a parallel parasitic capacitance forms between the receiver
electrode and receiver’s ground plane—which in our case is the ground plane of the buer board and the chas-
sis of the spectrum analyzer. is capacitance was characterized to be around 10 pF. For our frequency range
of interest ( f > 100 kHz ), the impedance from this 10 pF capacitance is much lower compared to the default
1 M input impedance of BUF602, and hence the net input impedance essentially becomes capacitive. If the
frequencies were to be lowered from 100 kHz, this approximation would indeed stop holding at some point and
a high pass eect similar to that of the 50 termination case would be seen. e purpose of the buer is to move
this transition point to a frequency much lower than the frequency range of interest, and maintain a capacitive
termination.
Calibration. As we have mentioned before, characterization of HBC systems demands the use of small form-
factor wearable/portable transmitting and receiving devices for accurate channel measurements. Unfortunately,
that prevents us from using precise bench-top measurement equipment. is calls for careful calibration of all
the transmitting and receiving devices to ensure accurate measurement results.
• To calibrate the three dierent transmitting devices, each of them is individually connected to a precise
bench-top Keysight spectrum analyzer. For each frequency point of interest, the displayed power of the fun-
damental peak at the spectrum analyzer is recorded. is record is used as a reference frequency dependent
transmitted power for all the transmitting devices.
• e accuracy of the receiving hand-held spectrum analyzer is also examined by connecting it directly to a
precise bench-top Keysight RF signal generator, and applying a sinusoidal RF signal at individual frequencies
of interest. e power of the applied RF signal is kept within the order of expected on-body received power.
Any deviation of the displayed power at the hand-held spectrum analyzer from the applied power is recorded
to be applied as a correction to future measurements.
• Finally, the buer is also characterized using the same Keysight signal generator and spectrum analyzer, and
it’s frequency characteristic is recorded.
To calculate the channel transfer at a given frequency, the previously recorded transmitted power is subtracted
from the measured received power. Correction for receiver deviation is then applied, and additionally the result
is adjusted for the buer characteristics in case of capacitive termination measurements.
Body to device coupler. To couple the transmitting and receiving devices to a subject’s body, an ESD wristband
is used, worn on the subject’s arm. e signal pin of a co-ax adapter is connected to the metal plate of the ESD
band by soldering a small piece of wire. An example of the coupler is shown in g. 9c. ese couplers are in turn
connected to the transmitting and receiving devices using a shielded co-ax cable.
Frequency sweep measurements. To obtain leakage or inter-body transfer characteristics over frequency, the
experiment subjects are asked to stand 1 m apart, facing each other. e transmitting device is coupled to one
subject while the receiving device to the other. e subjects operate the handheld transmitting and receiving
devices themselves to sweep frequency by hand. e receiving subject communicates the resulting peak power
to a third person standing away from the two subjects, to log data.
Received: 30 March 2020; Accepted: 27 November 2020
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Acknowledgements
is work was supported by Eli Lilly and Company through the Connected Health care initiative and in-part
by the Air Force Oce of Scientic Research (AFOSR) Young Investigator Award under Grant No. FA9550-
17-1-0450. e authors would like to thank PhD students Debayan Das, David Yang, Donghyun Seo, Baibhab
Chatterjee, Nirmoy Modak, Arunashish Datta, K Gaurav Kumar and Faizul M. Bari; as well as Visiting Scholar
Gargi Bhattacharya at Purdue University for their immense co-operation and support during the experiments.
Author contributions
M.N., S.M., S.W. and S.S. conceived the idea. S.A. designed the in-house EQS-HBC transmitter for experiments.
M.N. conducted the theoretical analysis, numerical simulations, and performed the experiments with help from
S.M. and supervision from S.W. and S.S. All authors contributed to the draing of this manuscript, and have read
and approved the nal version of the manuscript.
Competing interests
e authors declare no competing interests.
Additional inormation
Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to M.N.
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Scientifc Reports | (2021) 11:4378 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-79788-9 15
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