Multiparameter Fire Detection Based on

Wireless Sensor Network

Liu Shixing1, Tu Defeng1

Zhang Yongming2

School of Electronic Science& Applied Physics,

Hefei University of Technology,
Hefei, 230009, PRC
liusx@ustc.edu

State Key Laboratory of Fire Science,

University of science and Technology of china,
Hefei, 230026, PRC

AbstractWireless fire detection nodes based on Wireless sensor

network is designed which can detect temperature, humidity and
smoke concentration. The ratio of fire misinformation is
decreased with multiparameter coincidence technique. And a
shortest path routing algorithm is proposed according to multihop transmission based on CSMA/CA principle. The sensor
nodes can connect each other automatically and the sensor data
can be transmitted within minimum hops, so a real-time fire
monitoring system is built up. The result of experiment show: the
maximum distance of single hop transmission is 100m; the delay
time of every hop within multi-hop communications is about
50ms; the sensitivity of fire smoke reached to I level; the
parameter of humidity is used to eliminate the distorted effect of
water vapor.
Keywords-Wireless sensor network; WSN node; fire detection;
multiparameter; Multi-hop routing algorithm

I.

INTRODUCTION

Fire detection is to determine whether the fire occurred by

detecting the signal of the fire characteristic parameters. The
traditional fire detection alarm system adopts wired mode and
monitoring alarm information transmits through the wired
network to the central station. In ancient buildings with fire
protection and other special places, the layout of wired fire
alarm system on the buildings will cause some damage to
functionality and artistry of the buildings. Wireless Fire Alarm
System is a good way of achieving fire protection in ancient
building. Its biggest advantage is no wiring requirements and
convenient installation, which can minimize the damage to the
buildings. The self-organizing capability of wireless sensor
network makes the detection system complete the network
automatically during a very short time. The digitization and
networking of fire detection system is a current direction of
development. Studying deeply of multi-parameter fire detection
technology based on wireless sensor networks and developing
early fire detection systems with high reliability are effective
means of achieving fire detection.
II.

WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORK AND THE FIRE

DETECTION

Wireless sensor network achieves perceiving the

parameters information of the objective physical world through
a means of wireless network communication. Wireless sensor

_____________________________

network, applying related networks, is to study its technology

aiming at the specific application, which is the notable feature
of wireless sensor network application different from the
traditional network. Since the sensor node can sense the rapid
change of environmental parameters and has a strongpoint of
real-time performance and high accuracy, wireless sensor
network has incomparable advantage with traditional
technologies in unattended environmental monitoring, disaster
fighting and other special areas.
Real-time fire monitoring system based on wireless sensor
network uses a large number of low-cost and low-power microsensor nodes arranged in the monitoring region. All the sensor
nodes configured a wireless network automatically, which
achieve a real-time collection of environmental parameters of
temperature, humidity, smoke concentration and brightness etc
and a real-time data processing, thus achieving a rapid
reflection on anomalies of monitoring region. Combining
efficient localizer algorithm of sensor network nodes and the
fire position, we can identify the location of fire source quickly
and accurately. With the support of fire prediction and
spreading models, through an information fusion of multiparameters, using neural network self-learning, we can amend
continuously the model with the real-time data to realize the
precise fire prediction of the sensitive region.

Figure 1. diagram of fire monitoring system with WSN

Fire monitoring system based on wireless sensor network,

as shown in Fig.1,deploys a great deal of detection nodes
sensing parameter in the monitoring region, with a base station
as a cluster node connected to the computer. Detection nodes

978-1-4244-4738-1/09/$25.00 2009 IEEE



not only can configure a network automatically with a multihop routing, but also have the ability to perceive temperature
and humidity and smoke concentrations. The base station is
responsible for collecting data from all detection nodes to the
computer to process and display.
MULTI-PARAMETERS WIRELESS FIRE DETECTION
NODES

III.

Intelligent fire detector integrates signal detection and

signal processing within the detector. The microprocessor
process the collected data on the spot without having
transmission circuitry, which improves the true degree of the
signal .Intelligent detector integrates the advanced algorithm of
fire judgment. According to the characteristics of different fire
types to determine fire happening, it makes the reliability of
fire detection greatly enhanced. It also can effectively track and
compensate changes of the surrounding environment, reducing
the probability of misinformation and omissions. Since the
amount of data exchanged between the detector and the
controller is small, the probability of interference is
accordingly lowed. The data checking on the communication
protocol makes the reliability of the system more increased.
Hardware structure of fire detection node, as shown in
Fig.2 , is composed of the wireless sensor network
communication nodes and multi-parameter fire detection units.
Hardware structure of the base station distinguished from the
detection node is only without the detection units of fire
parameters, which is only responsible for data transmission and
collection of sensor.
RF module

Microprocessor

WSN communication node

Fire
parameter
detection
it

Figure 2. Hardware structure of fire detection node

A. Multi-parameter composite fire detection unit

Multi-parameter composite fire detection unit is composed
of two modules, temperature and humidity detection module
and photoelectric-type smoke detection module; low-power
design is adopted in detection modules. The average operating
current of the integration temperature and humidity sensor is
28A.The quiescent current of photoelectric smoke detection
amplifier is 45A.
The mechanism of photoelectric-type smoke detection is
that the particles using the same wavelength re-radiate the
received energy when the smoke particles interacting with light.
Generally in different directions its intensity of re-radiation is
different, this process is known as scattering. Fire smoke
detection uses the monitoring method of the forward light
scattering, which is mainly composed of the optical detection
chamber and the associated circuit. The optical maze which is
the channel between smoke and the detection room lies at the
outer of the detection room, composing the optical detection
room cavity with the shading component parts to minimize the
impact of ambient light. Smoke particles maze is also formed,
making the smoke easily inflow and difficultly outflow to



reduce the impact of the outside airflow. Smoke particles signal

detection is achieved through a pair of transmitting and
receiving infrared light diodes. Microprocessor-controlled
infrared transmitting diode emits the pulse light to the detection
room. When the detection room is no smoke particles, light can
not reach the receiving diode due to the resistance of light
shading plate and there is no signal output. When the fire
taking place, there are smoke particles entering the optical
detection room then the infrared light scattering by smoke
particles reach the photodiode, resulting in current signal, and
the scattered light signal enhances with the increase in the
concentration of smoke. The amplified signal sends to the ADC
embedded in the microprocessor to process in order to get
smoke detection data.
Temperature and humidity monitoring adopt the intelligent
temperature and humidity sensor chip SHT11, providing digital
output of a full range calibration. The sensor includes a
capacitive polymer humidity sense organ and a temperature
sense organ of bandgap material, producing respectively a
signal of relative humidity or temperature. The amplified
signals respectively send to the 14 bits ADC for analog-todigital conversion, After calibration and error correction, and
finally the relative temperature and humidity data send to the
microprocessor through the two-wire serial interface .
B. Wireless fire detection node
Control software of wireless fire detection node can be
divided into four layers, as follows: the underlying hardware
drivers, communication protocol layer (MAC protocols and
routing protocols), the operating system and application
assignment.
The underlying hardware drivers include drivers of
CC2420 RF chip, drivers of detector modules, as well as
drivers of equipments in microprocessor. Through the SPI bus,
microprocessor can communicate with CC2420, which can be
easily used to realize configuring RF chip and transmitting and
receiving of data, such as parameters of network address,
channel settings and reading and writing of FIFO, etc. The
detector module drivers realize data acquisition by sensors.
After power-up the detection module firstly does the
measurement of temperature and humidity, and then read data
after the end of measurement. Then, start the detection of
photoelectric smoke. The ADC converter embedded in
microprocessors gets the digital quantum of smoke
concentration. Microprocessor does jobs of fire determination
and data package. Through the interface, the application
assignment layer carry on a series of operations which from the
detection of fire parameters to the processing of data.
Fire criteria include temperature parameter t, the
temperature change parameter dt, the smoke measurement
parameter s, the increase quantum of smoke ds, which can
be used to determine the fire of single-node. In fire criteria, t
and sare the data values collected by sensor and dt is
difference value of the temperature this time compared with the
previous time. If temperature of this time is higher than the
previous time, the value is dt+1, or else dt-1.The added
value of smoke concentration: ds=The current value ds+
(current values-last values)/8, if ds<0 then ds=0.

In condition that relative humidity is less than the threshold

value, if one of the four following criteria conditions is fulfilled,
we can determine fire occurrence. Criterion 1: ds>5 and dt>3;
Criterion 2: ds>10; Criterion 3: t the threshold of
temperature;Criterion 4:sthe threshold of smoke concentration.
Criterion 1 is for naked flame because of naked flame has less
smoke, but the temperature has a marked increase. Therefore,
when there is an increase in temperature and a small amount of
smoke, we could determine a fire occurrence. Criterion 2 is
used to detect the early smoldering fire. When the smoke
detection increases obviously, we determine that the early fire
occurrence. Criterion 3, 4 use the algorithm of threshold to
determine. In the experiment the temperature threshold is set to
42 and the smoke threshold is set to 40%. Humidity
conditions designed to prevent the misinformation caused by
water vapor. The compensation of the humidity can erase
misinformation because photoelectric smoke detector is
sensitive to water vapor. In addition, a criterion 5 that is multiparameter neural network criterion with self-learning ability is
set up to further improve the accuracy of early warning fire
detection and reliability.
Packet format: Nodes directly compose data to data packet
of MAC frame format, and store the data in the data packet
FIFO distributed by system, and then provide the data to the
communication layer. The method make MAC layer doesn't
need to make packet again when sending data.
TABLE I.

THE CONTENT OF DATA PACKET

PSD length
Packet
length
1 byte

Date of MAC layer

header of MAC
layer
11 bytes

Warning
sign

Smoke
data

Temperature
date

1 byte

2 bytes

2 bytes

The data transmission channel access-mechanism of MAC

layer uses of CSMA / CA algorithm, which has three important
parameters preserved by each device which transmits single
data respectively. The parameters are NB (the number of back,
the initial value is 0), CW (collision window, the initial value
of 2) and BE (back exponent, the initial value of 2).
Taking the single-hop limited communication distance
between nodes into account, for the practical application of fire
alarm, from the low power and low complexity algorithm, the
design of a shortest path routing algorithm achieves multi-hop
data transmission. The basic idea of algorithm is that the node
maintains locally a neighbor node list in the process of joining
the network. The least hops neighbor node from the base
station is stored in the list. When data transmission, the node
randomly selects a neighbor node from the list as next hop
routing node.The neighbor node then transmits the data in the
same way until the data reached the base station. At the same
time the uses of transmission acknowledge mechanism
ACKand the checking mechanism of packet serial number
ensure the reliability of data transmission. After the destination
node receiving the packet it then return a confirmation message
(ACK frame) to the source node. The source node, after
sending a packet, needs to wait for a confirmation frame back
from the destination node. If the source node does not receive
the frame ACK within the scheduled time, then it resends the
packet 2 to the destination node. Using IEEE802.15.4
reference standards, the establishment of a packet serial

number checking mechanism ensures that data packets during

transmission do not repeat the transmission avoiding
unnecessary data transmission load of the network.
The main application tasks include: network request,
detection of fire characteristic parameters, Data sending, data
reception and processing. In order to improve the real-time
ability and stability of system operation and meet the lowpower requirements of detection nodes, the implementation of
the application tasks are achieved by the disruption. In
networking, the controller does the job of monitoring the fire,
acquiring of and processing the temperature and humidity and
smoke concentration, making sure if there is a fire disaster by
using the fire criterion algorithm, and sending the results.

C. Background monitoring software and data processing

Through a kind of graphics tool which is called LabVIEW,
we design a background application that runs on PC. The
monitoring software can not only deal with and analyze the
information about sensor and router, but also can display the
temperature and humidity, smoke concentration and router
information about the node. And it can combine and calculate
the parameters of many nodes. By neural network algorithm, it
can help us to determine the occurrence of fire and further
reduce the possibility of mistaken.
Through the achievement of five parallel threads, the
background software can realize the function of alarming by
thread 1 and thread 2, when the node receives the data to
determine case of fire, sound and light alarm will be issued;
thread 3 to read the serial data and sub-treatment, thread 4 and
thread 5 can realize the simulation of communication between
nodes and display the data curve. To enhance the accuracy of
alarming and reduce the possibility of misinformation and
omissions, in the detection of nodes, a preliminary judge will
be processed, the data fusion technology based on neural
network algorithm will be undertaken after data sending to a
computer. Through the way mentioned above, the temperature
and humidity and smoke concentration and alarm value can be
combined together and calculated.
IV.

EXPERIMENTAL DATA

A. The detection sensitivity of fire smoke

By referring to national standard GB 4715-2005 which is a
kind of smoke fire detector, we arrange six composite detector
nodes along three meters loop in the standard fire laboratory,
respectively node 1 to node 6. Besides we install point-type
photoelectric smoke detectors S2 and S4, symmetrical with
node 1 and node 2 respectively for reference.
The standard cotton rope fire is used in this test, the data of
node 1 and 2 with reference data of photoelectric smoke
detectors S2, S4 are shown in Figure 3. The change trend is
similar, while the response time to smoke of node 1, 2 is less
than the wired photoelectric smoke detectors S2, S4.
The threshold response time is defined as:



Threshold response time = system alarm time - the time of

smoke spreading
The time of smoke spreading is invariable in a particular
experimental condition, so the threshold response time is
depend on the sensitivity of detectors.

and also a random delay. With the increase of routing hops, the
latency effect of time delay is randomly longer. In the case of
no more than 4 hops the delay time is less than 150ms and
every increase of 1 hop, the average delay time tDA will
increase about 50ms.
TABLE III.

For the same sensitivity (I class), the response time of node

1 and 2 with reference of smoke detector is shown in table II
and Fig.3. Comparison curve of the temperature
measurement data detected by the node 4 and 5 and the data of
thermocouple Res1, 2 in the combustion chamber system is
shown in Fig. 4 .
TABLE II.
RESPONSE TIME OF SMOKE DETECTION
the response time of I class
Full-scale response time
No. detectors
/Second
/Second
std2

38

std4

43

65
53

node1

30

41

node2

41

61

DELAY TIME OF DATA TRANSMIT

Hop number

tDA (ms

3.2

59.4

109.1

145.9

V.

CONCLUSION

Using the micromation, low power and complex detection

unit of temperature, humidity and smoke concentration, we
developed a multiparameter fire detection node based on
wireless sensor network.We also developed a multi-hop routing
protocol of wireless sensor network for the fire monitoring and
established a multi-parameter fire detection alarm system based
on wireless sensor network. Multiple nodes achieve the goal of
fire alarm by working together and adopting multi-parameter
fuzzy-neural network algorithm in the monitoring system. In
particular, the using of humidity parameter enhances the
capability of the detection nodes to anti-false and eliminates the
mistake caused by high temperature and high humidity. This
system can achieve real-time monitoring of some characteristic
parameters such as temperature, humidity and smoke
concentration in important place. Compared with the
traditional detection system, this kind of system has a particular
advantage in the protection of ancient buildings and other
special places that is not suitable for the layout of wired fire
alarm system. In a word, this kind of system has an abroad
future.

Figure 3. Response time of photoelectric smoke sensor

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The work was supported by the National Science and
Technology Support Project on the Study of Fire Safety
Engineering of Old, Historic Buildings which with the
represent of the Potala Palace in Tibet(2006BAK06B07)
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