Wireless data concentrators for aircraft data networks

A wireless data concentrator for a data network of an aircraft, the wireless data concentrator comprising:

• a Printed Circuit Board (PCB);
• a controller electrically coupled to the PCB;
• four Radio Frequency (RF) transceivers electrically coupled to the PCB that are disposed around the controller, each configured to communicate with the controller and at least one wireless sensor that measures an environment of the aircraft;
• and
• four inverted-F PCB trace antennas fabricated into the PCB, each electrically coupled to one of the RF transceivers and disposed orthogonally to each other around the controller;
• the controller configured to receive sensor data about the environment of the aircraft from the at least one wireless sensor utilizing at least one the RF transceivers, and to provide the sensor data to the data network of the aircraft utilizing a data backbone of the data network.

A wireless data concentrator for a data network of an aircraft, the wireless data concentrator comprising:

• a controller electrically coupled to a Printed Circuit Board (PCB);
• four Radio Frequency (RF) transceivers electrically coupled to the PCB that are disposed around the controller, each configured to communicate with the controller and at least one wireless sensor that measures an environment of the aircraft;
• and
• four PCB trace antennas fabricated into the PCB, each electrically coupled to one of the RF transceivers and disposed orthogonally to each other around the controller;
• the controller configured to receive sensor data about the environment of the aircraft from the at least one wireless sensor utilizing at least one of the RF transceivers, and to provide the sensor data to the data network of the aircraft.