The Internet of Things (IoT) is essential in innovative applications such as smart cities, smart homes, education, healthcare, transportation, and defense operations. IoT applications are particularly beneficial for providing healthcare because they enable secure and real-time remote patient monitoring to improve the quality of people’s lives. This review paper explores the latest trends in healthcare-monitoring systems by implementing the role of the IoT. The work discusses the benefits of IoT-based healthcare systems with regard to their significance, and the benefits of IoT healthcare. We provide a systematic review on recent studies of IoT-based healthcare-monitoring systems through literature review. The literature review compares various systems’ effectiveness, efficiency, data protection, privacy, security, and monitoring. The paper also explores wireless- and wearable-sensor-based IoT monitoring systems and provides a classification of healthcare-monitoring sensors. We also elaborate, in detail, on the challenges and open issues regarding healthcare security and privacy, and QoS. Finally, suggestions and recommendations for IoT healthcare applications are laid down at the end of the study along with future directions related to various recent technology trends.

Low-power wide-area network (LPWAN) technologies play a pivotal role in IoT applications, owing to their capability to meet the key IoT requirements (e.g., long range, low cost, small data volumes, massive device number, and low energy consumption). Between all obtainable LPWAN technologies, long-range wide-area network (LoRaWAN) technology has attracted much interest from both industry and academia due to networking autonomous architecture and an open standard specification. This paper presents a comparative review of five selected driving LPWAN technologies, including NB-IoT, SigFox, Telensa, Ingenu (RPMA), and LoRa/LoRaWAN. The comparison shows that LoRa/LoRaWAN and SigFox surpass other technologies in terms of device lifetime, network capacity, adaptive data rate, and cost. In contrast, NB-IoT technology excels in latency and quality of service. Furthermore, we present a technical overview of LoRa/LoRaWAN technology by considering its main features, opportunities, and open issues. We also compare the most important simulation tools for investigating and analyzing LoRa/LoRaWAN network performance that has been developed recently. Then, we introduce a comparative evaluation of LoRa simulators to highlight their features. Furthermore, we classify the recent efforts to improve LoRa/LoRaWAN performance in terms of energy consumption, pure data extraction rate, network scalability, network coverage, quality of service, and security. Finally, although we focus more on LoRa/LoRaWAN issues and solutions, we introduce guidance and directions for future research on LPWAN technologies.

Home automation systems have attracted considerable attention with the advancement of communications technology. A smart home (SH) is an Internet of Things (IoT) application that utilizes the Internet to monitor and control appliances using a home automation system. Lack of IoT technology usage, unfriendly user interface, limited wireless transmission range, and high costs are the limitations of existing home automation systems. Therefore, this study presents a cost-effective and hybrid (local and remote) IoT-based home automation system with a user-friendly interface for smartphones and laptops. A prototype called IoT@HoMe is developed with an algorithm to enable the monitoring of home conditions and automate the control of home appliances over the Internet anytime and anywhere. This system utilizes a node microcontroller unit (NodeMCU) as a Wi-Fi-based gateway to connect different sensors and updates their data to Adafruit IO cloud server. The collected data from several sensors (radio-frequency identification, ultrasonic, temperature, humidity, gas, and motion sensors) can be accessed via If This Then That (IFTTT) on users’ devices (smartphones and/or laptops) over the Internet regardless of their location. A set of relays is used to connect the NodeMCU to homes under controlled appliances. The designed system is structured in a portable manner as a control box that can be attached for monitoring and controlling a real house. The proposed IoT-based system for home automation can easily and efficiently control appliances over the Internet and support home safety with autonomous operation. IoT@HoMe is a low cost and reliable automation system that reduces energy consumption and can notably provide convenience, safety, and security for SH residents.

This study proposes a smart long-range (LoRa) sensing node to timely collect the air quality information and update it on the cloud. The developed long-range wide area network (LoRaWAN)-based Internet of Things (IoT) air quality monitoring system (AQMS), hereafter called LoRaWAN-IoT-AQMS, was deployed in an outdoor environment to validate its reliability and effectiveness. The system is composed of multiple sensors (NO 2 , SO 2 , CO 2 , CO, PM 2.5 , temperature, and humidity), Arduino microcontroller, LoRa shield, LoRaWAN gateway, and The Thing Network (TTN) IoT platform. The LoRaWAN-IoT-AQMS is a standalone system powered continuously by a rechargeable battery with a photovoltaic solar panel via a solar charger shield for sustainable operation. Our system simultaneously gathers the considered air quality information by using the smart sensing unit. Then, the system transmits the information through the gateway to the TTN platform, which is integrated with the ThingSpeak IoT server. This action updates the collected data and displays these data on a developed Web-based dashboard and a Graphical User Interface (GUI) that uses the Virtuino mobile application. Thus, the displayed information can be easily accessed by users via their smartphones. The results obtained by the developed LoRaWAN-IoT-AQMS are validated by comparing them with experimental results based on the high-technology Aeroqual air quality monitoring devices. Our system can reliably monitor various air quality indicators and efficiently transmit the information in real time over the Internet.

The current number of working mothers has greatly increased. Subsequently, baby care has become a daily challenge for many families. Thus, most parents send their babies to their grandparents' house or to baby care houses. However, the parents cannot continuously monitor their babies' conditions either in normal or abnormal situations. Therefore, an Internet of Things-based Baby Monitoring System (IoT-BBMS) is proposed as an efficient and low-cost IoT-based system for monitoring in real time. We also proposed a new algorithm for our system that plays a key role in providing better baby care while parents are away. In the designed system, Node Micro-Controller Unit (NodeMCU) Controller Board is exploited to gather the data read by the sensors and uploaded via Wi-Fi to the AdaFruit MQTT server. The proposed system exploits sensors to monitor the baby's vital parameters, such as ambient temperature, moisture, and crying. A prototype of the proposed baby cradle has been designed using Nx Siemens software, and a red meranti wood is used as the material for the cradle. The system architecture consists of a baby cradle that will automatically swing using a motor when the baby cries. Parents can also monitor their babies' condition through an external web camera and switch on the lullaby toy located on the baby cradle remotely via the MQTT server to entertain the baby. The proposed system prototype is fabricated and tested to prove its effectiveness in terms of cost and simplicity and to ensure safe operation to enable the baby-parenting anywhere and anytime through the network. Finally, the baby monitoring system is proven to work effectively in monitoring the baby's situation and surrounding conditions according to the prototype.