SENSOR NETWORS
Introduction
• A wireless sensor network (WSN) is a wireless network consisting of
spatially distributed autonomous devices using sensors to
cooperatively monitor physical or environmental conditions, such as
temperature, sound, vibration, pressure, motion or pollutants, at
different locations.
• A collection of sensing devices that can communicate wirelessly.
Wireless Sensor Networks(WSN)
• Even though wireless sensors has limited resources in memory,
computation power, bandwidth, and energy.
• With small physical size. It Can be embedded in the physical
environment.
• Self-organizing multi-hop ad-doc networks
Architecture for a WSN(Wireless Network
Architecture)
Special addressing requirement
• Local unique addresses
• Data-centric
• Example: Each node has an unique number. Attribute-based naming
architecture
• Data is named by one or more attributes.
• Example: Each node is distinguished by an attribute – GPS sensors are
practical for this.
Wireless Sensor Node
• sensor
– A transducer
– converts physical phenomenon e.g. heat, light, motion, vibration, and sound
into electrical signals.
• sensor node
– basic unit in sensor network
– contains on-board sensors, processor, memory, transceiver, and power supply
• sensor network
– consists of a large number of sensor nodes
– nodes deployed either inside or very close to the sensed phenomenon
Architecture of Sensor Node
Transceiver
Sensor 1
Power Source
Micro-Controller ADC
Sensor 2
External Memory
Data Aggregation in WSNs
– Solves implosion and overlap problem
– Energy efficient
Characteristics
• Power consumption constraints for nodes using batteries or energy harvesting
• Ability to cope with node failures (resilience)
• Mobility of nodes
• Heterogeneity of nodes
• Scalability to large scale of deployment
• Ability to withstand harsh environmental conditions
• Ease of use
• Cross-layer design
Factors Influencing WSN Design
• Fault tolerance
• Scalability
• Production costs
• Hardware constraints
• Sensor network topology
• Environment
• Transmission media
• Power Consumption
– Sensing
– Communication
– Data processing
Applications
• Military Applications
• Environmental Applications
• Health Applications
• Home and Office Applications
• Automotive Applications
• Other Commercial Applications
Advantages
• It avoids a lot of wiring .
• It can accommodate new devices at any time .
• It's flexible to go through physical partitions .
• It can be accessed through a centralized monitor
Disadvantages
• Lower speed compared to wired network.
• Less secure because hacker's laptop can act as Access Point. If you
connected to their laptop, they'll read all your information (username,
password.. etc).
• More complex to configure than wired network.
• Gets distracted by various elements like Blue-tooth .
• Still Costly at large.
• It does not make sensing quantities in buildings easier.
• It does not reduce costs for installation of sensors.
• It does not allow us to do more than can be done with a wired system
Design Challenges
• Heterogeneity
– The devices deployed may be of various types and need to
collaborate with each other.
• Distributed Processing
– The algorithms need to be centralized as the processing is carried
out on different nodes.
• Low Bandwidth Communication
– The data should be transferred efficiently between sensors
Continued..
• Large Scale Coordination
– The sensors need to coordinate with each other to
produce required results.
• Utilization of Sensors
– The sensors should be utilized in a ways that produce the
maximum performance and use less energy.
• Real Time Computation
– The computation should be done quickly as new data is
always being generated.
Operational Challenges of Wireless Sensor
Networks
• Energy Efficiency
• Limited storage and computation
• Low bandwidth and high error rates
• Errors are common – Wireless communication
– Noisy measurements
– Node failure are expected
• Scalability to a large number of sensor nodes
• Survivability in harsh environments
• Experiments are time- and space-intensive
Future of WSN
• Smart Home / Smart Office
• Sensors controlling appliances and
electrical devices in the house.
• Better lighting and heating in office
buildings.
• The Pentagon building has used
sensors extensively.
Conclusion
• WSNs possible today due to technological advancement in various
domains
• Envisioned to become an essential part of our lives
• Design Constraints need to be satisfied for realization of sensor
networks
• Tremendous research efforts being made in different layers of WSNs
protocol stack
