Wireless Sensor Networks

(WSNs)
Week #3

BS(CS) Part-3
2nd Semester
 Introduction: Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs)

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are composed of a large number of

small, inexpensive and low power sensing devices (usually called sensor
nodes) that are densely deployed to measure a given physical
phenomenon. 2
 Introduction: Characteristics of WSNs
 Wireless Sensor Networks mainly consists of sensors.
Sensors are -
low power
limited memory
energy constrained due to their small size.
 Wireless networks can also be deployed in extreme
environmental conditions and may be prone to enemy
attacks.
 Although deployed in an ad hoc manner they need to be
self organized and self healing and can face constant
reconfiguration.
3
 Examples for Sensor Nodes

UCLA: WINS

UC Berkeley:
UC Berkeley: COTS Dust Smart Dust

JPL: Sensor Webs

Rockwell: WINS
4
 Introduction
• Classification of WSNs
– Static WSNs - sensor nodes could not change
their physical location
• Static WSNs are less efficient when there is need to
monitor a large area or there is need to access or
monitor mobile targets

– Mobile WSNs - Sensor nodes can change their

physical locations.
• Mobile WSNs are more efficient and useful as
compared to static WSNs due to their mobility
feature.
5
 Introduction
• Key technologies that enable WSNs
1. Micro electro-mechanical systems (MEMS)
• MEMS are very small devices comprising of integrated mechanical
(levers, springs, deformable membranes, vibrating structures, etc.)
and electrical (resistors, capacitors, inductors, etc.) components
• MEMS are designed to sense and report the physical phenomenon
of their immediate or local environment and/or to perform some kind
of controlled physical interaction or actuation with their immediate
or local environment.

2. Digital electronics
3. Wireless communications
6
 WSNs Applications
• Military Applications
• Environmental Applications
• Healthcare Applications
• Home and Office Applications
• Automotive Applications
• Commercial Applications
• Disaster Relief Applications
• etc…
7
 WSNs Applications
Military Applications
– Monitoring friendly forces, equipment, and weapons
– Battlefield surveillance
– Monitoring and targeting enemy forces
– Battle damage assessment
– Nuclear, biological, and chemical attack detection

Environmental Applications
– Forest fire detection and flood detection
– Air and water pollution detection
– Tracking the movements of birds, small animals, and insects
– Monitoring environmental conditions that affect crops and
livestock Irrigation 8
 WSNs Applications
Health Applications
– Monitoring of human physiological data
– Providing interfaces (applications) to support disabled
(special) persons
– Tracking doctors inside a hospital
– Monitoring patients, etc.

Home and Office Applications

– Monitoring and controlling energy/electricity usage in home
– Monitoring and controlling home appliances
– Smart office environment
9
 WSNs Applications

Automotive Applications
– Reduces wiring effects
– Measurements in chambers and rotating parts
– Remote technical inspections, etc

10
 WSNs Applications

Other Commercial Applications

– Environmental control in office buildings (estimated
energy savings ____ billion per year!)
– Interactive museums
– Vehicle tracking and detection
– Detecting and monitoring car thefts
– Managing inventory control
– Toys and interactive games
– etc…

11
Underwater Acoustic WSNs

12
Factors Influencing
WSNs Design

13
 Factors Influencing WSNs Design
1. Fault Tolerance (Reliability)
2. Scalability
3. Production Costs
4. Hardware Constraints
5. Topology
6. Operating Environment
7. Transmission Media
8. Power Consumption
• Sensing
• Communication
• Data processing
14
 1. Fault Tolerance (Reliability)
 Sensor nodes may fail or be blocked due to lack of
power, have physical damage, or environmental
interference.

 The failure of sensor nodes should not affect the overall

task of the sensor network.

 This is called RELIABILITY or FAULT TOLERANCE,

i.e., ability to sustain sensor network functionality without
any interruption

15
 1. Fault Tolerance (Reliability)
REMARK:
1. Protocols and algorithms may be designed to address the level of
fault tolerance required by WSNs.
2. If the environment has little interference, then the requirements can
be more relaxed.
Examples:
1. House to keep track of humidity and temperature levels  the
sensors cannot be damaged easily or interfered by environments 
low fault tolerance (reliability) requirement!!!!

2. Battlefield for surveillance the sensed data are critical and sensors
can be destroyed by enemies  high fault tolerance
(reliability) requirement!!!
Bottom-line
Fault Tolerance (Reliability) depends heavily on applications!!!
16
 2. Scalability
 The density of sensor nodes can range from few to several
hundreds in a region (cluster) which can be less than 10m in diameter.

Examples:
1.Personal/Wearable Applications:
Ranges from 10 to 100, e.g., clothing, eye glasses, shoes, watch,
jewelry

2. Home Applications: 2 dozens or more.

3. Environmental Monitoring and Control Applications:

Range from 25 to 100 nodes/cluster

4. Smart Environment (smart shopping malls, smart offices, etc)

Applications:
Ranges from 100s to 1000s
17
 3. Production Costs

 Cost of sensors must be low so that the sensor network

can be justified!!!

THE OBJECTIVE FOR SENSOR COSTS must be

lower than $1!!!!!!!

Currently:  COTS Dust Motes  ranges from $15 to

$172 (STILL VERY EXPENSIVE!!!!)

18
 4. Sensor Node Hardware
Location Finding System Mobilizer

Processor
Sensor ADC Transceiver
Memory

Power Unit Power Generator

Characteristics of Sensor Node

Small, Low power, Low bit rate, High density , Low
cost (dispensable), Autonomous,
19
Adaptive
 5. Topology
Topology maintenance and change:
1. Pre-deployment and Deployment Phase
2. Post Deployment Phase
3. Re-Deployment of Additional Nodes

Sink
Internet,
Satellite, etc

Sink

Task
Manager

20
 5. Topology
Pre-deployment and Deployment Phase
 Sensor networks can be deployed by:
 Dropping from a plane
 Delivering in an artillery shell, rocket or missile
 Throwing by a catapult (from a ship board, etc.)
Being placed one by one by a human or a robot
etc...

 Initial deployment schemes must:

 Reduce installation cost
 Eliminate the need for any pre-organization and pre-
planning
 Increase the flexibility of arrangement
 Promote self organization and fault tolerance.
21
 5. Topology
POST-DEPLOYMENT PHASE
After deployment, topology changes are due to change
in sensor nodes’
 position
 reachability (due to jamming, noise, moving obstacles, etc.)
 available energy
 malfunctioning

 It is essential to have some mechanisms to detect changes

in network topology and to manage it autonomously after
deployment phase.

22
 6. Operating Environment
 Sensor networks may work:
 in busy intersections
 in the interior of a large machinery
 at the bottom of an ocean
at the surface of an ocean
 in a biologically or chemically contaminated field in a battlefield
beyond the enemy lines
 in a house or a large building
 in a large warehouse
 attached to animals
 attached to fast moving vehicles
 in a drain or river
etc …

23
 7. Transmission Media
 Radio or Infrared or Optical Media
 In a Multi-hop sensor network nodes are linked by Wireless
medium
– Radio Frequency (RF)
• Most of the current sensor node hardware is based on it
• Do not need Line of Sight
• Facilitates hiding of the sensors at deployment level
– Infrared (IR)
• License free
• Robust to interference
• Cheaper and easier to build
• Require line of sight
• Short Range Solution
– Optical Media
• Require Line of sight 24
 8. Power Consumption
 Sensor node has limited power source, thus, sensor
node’s LIFETIME depends on battery lifetime
 Sensors can be a DATA ORIGINATOR or a DATA
ROUTER.
 Power conservation and power management are
important  POWER AWARE PROTOCOLS must be
developed.
 Power consumption in a sensor network can be divided
into three domains:
Communication
 Data Processing
 Sensing 25
 8. Power Consumption
 Communication: A sensor consumes maximum
energy in data communication (both for transmission
and reception).
 For very short range communication, transmission
and reception power costs are approximately the
same.
 e.g., modern low power short range transceivers consume
between 15 to 300 milliwatts of power when sending and
receiving)

 However, if range increases, then, transmitting

data consumes more power than receiving data.
26
 8. Power Consumption
START-UP POWER - REMARKS:

 Sensors communicate in short data packets, so start-

up power starts dominating as packet size is reduced .

 It is inefficient to frequently turn the transceiver ON

and OFF, because a large amount of power is spent in
turning the transceiver back ON each time.

27
 8. Power Consumption
in Data Processing
 There is much less power required in data processing as
compared to the power consumption in communication.

 EXAMPLE: Energy cost of transmitting 1 KB a

distance of 100 m is approx. equal to executing 3 Million
instructions by a 100 million instructions per second
processor.

 Local or in-network data processing is crucial in

minimizing power consumption in a multi-hop network.

28
 8. Power Consumption
in Sensing

Power Consumption in Sensing Depends on:

 Application
 Nature of sensing: Irregular/Random or Constant
 Detection complexity
 Ambient noise levels

29
 WSNs
Design Challenges

30
 WSNs Design Challenges
• Heterogeneity
– The devices deployed maybe of various types and need
to collaborate with each other.

• Distributed Processing
– The algorithms need to be distributed as the processing
is carried out on different nodes.

• Low Bandwidth Communication

– The data should be transferred efficiently between
sensors

31
 WSNs Design Challenges
• 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 way that produce the
maximum performance and consume less energy.

• Real Time Computation

– The computation should be done quickly as new data is
always being generated.

32
 Operational Challenges of WSNs
• Energy Efficiency
• Limited storage and limited computational capability
• Low bandwidth and high error rates
• Errors are common due to:
– Wireless communication
– Noisy measurements
– Node failures are always expected
• Scalability to a large number of sensor nodes
• Survivability/sustainability in harsh hostile and
unattended environments

33
 THANKS!

Next Class
WSNs Communication Architecture