TY - THES
T1 - Finding boundary cycles in location-free low density wireless sensor networks for mobile target tracking
AU - Sitanayah, Lanny
PY - 2009
Y1 - 2009
N2 - Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) comprise a large number of sensor nodes, which are spread out within a region and communicate using wireless links. In some WSN applications, recognizing boundary nodes is important for topology discovery, geographic routing and tracking. In this thesis, we study the problem of identifying the boundary nodes of a WSN. In a WSN, close-by nodes can communicate with their neighbors and have the ability to estimate distances to nearby nodes, but not necessarily the true distances. Our objective is to find the boundary nodes by using the connectivity relation and neighbor distance information without any knowledge of node locations. Moreover, our main aim is to design a distributed algorithm that works even when the average degree is low. We propose a heuristic algorithm to find the boundary nodes which are connected in a boundary cycle of a location-free, low density, randomly deployed WSN. We develop the key ideas of our boundary detection algorithm in the centralized scenario and extend these ideas to the distributed scenario. Then, we show by simulation experiments that the distributed implementation outperforms the centralized one. The centralized implementation relies on the connectivity of the network to the base station. Therefore, for low density disconnected networks, the algorithm cannot find boundaries in partitions of the network that cannot establish connection to the base station. This condition leads to a low quality of boundary discovery. In contrast, the distributed implementation is more realistic for real WSNs, especially for relatively sparse networks when all local information cannot be collected very well due to sparse connectivity. In low-degree disconnected networks, the simulation results show that the distributed implementation has a higher quality of boundaries compared to the centralized implementation.
AB - Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) comprise a large number of sensor nodes, which are spread out within a region and communicate using wireless links. In some WSN applications, recognizing boundary nodes is important for topology discovery, geographic routing and tracking. In this thesis, we study the problem of identifying the boundary nodes of a WSN. In a WSN, close-by nodes can communicate with their neighbors and have the ability to estimate distances to nearby nodes, but not necessarily the true distances. Our objective is to find the boundary nodes by using the connectivity relation and neighbor distance information without any knowledge of node locations. Moreover, our main aim is to design a distributed algorithm that works even when the average degree is low. We propose a heuristic algorithm to find the boundary nodes which are connected in a boundary cycle of a location-free, low density, randomly deployed WSN. We develop the key ideas of our boundary detection algorithm in the centralized scenario and extend these ideas to the distributed scenario. Then, we show by simulation experiments that the distributed implementation outperforms the centralized one. The centralized implementation relies on the connectivity of the network to the base station. Therefore, for low density disconnected networks, the algorithm cannot find boundaries in partitions of the network that cannot establish connection to the base station. This condition leads to a low quality of boundary discovery. In contrast, the distributed implementation is more realistic for real WSNs, especially for relatively sparse networks when all local information cannot be collected very well due to sparse connectivity. In low-degree disconnected networks, the simulation results show that the distributed implementation has a higher quality of boundaries compared to the centralized implementation.
KW - Computer algorithms
KW - Mobile communication systems
KW - Sensor networks
KW - Wireless communication systems
KW - Wireless LANs
KW - Location-free
KW - Boundary cycles
KW - Distributed algorithm
M3 - Master's Thesis
ER -