Title
Deploying Power-Aware, Wireless Sensor Agents
Abstract
Developing sensor agents that can be deployed untethered in the field presents significant challenges in adapting to hardware, communication, power and environmental limitations. Real-world characteristics dictate agent behavior and operating strategies, sometimes quite differently from often held assumptions and intuitions. In this article, we describe the sensor-agent hardware and blackboard-system software used in CNAS (collaborative network for atmospheric sensing), an agent-based, power-aware sensor network for ground-level atmospheric monitoring. CNAS is representative of a class of battery-powered, wireless sensor networks in which the distance separating deployed sensor agents is near the limit of their WiFi communication range. To conserve battery power, CNAS sensor agents must have their wireless radios turned off most of the time, as even having them turned on consumes significant power. This limitation complicates agent interaction and network responsiveness, because an agent cannot simply turn on its radio when it needs to send a message. CNAS agents also must have their radios turned on when others are sending messages to them and to support multi-hop message forwarding. We discuss how CNAS agents collaborate using only periodic radio availability and consider how different hardware and communication capabilities would change CNAS strategies. We also relate challenges that had to be addressed during deployments of CNAS at military exercises held in the summer heat in Wisconsin and in the rain and mud in Queensland, Australia. We conclude with research on improving CNAS responsiveness with limited radio availability and on potential next-generation CNAS hardware.
Year
DOI
Venue
2011
10.1093/comjnl/bxp107
Comput. J.
Keywords
Field
DocType
cnas strategy,power-aware sensor network,wireless sensor network,sensor-agent hardware,cnas responsiveness,wireless sensor agents,deploying power-aware,potential next-generation cnas hardware,agent-based networks,applications and real-world deployments of sensor networks,different hardware,cnas agent,sensor agent,power-aware sensor agents,cnas sensor agent,sensor network
Message forwarding,Key distribution in wireless sensor networks,Wireless,Computer security,Computer science,Environmental limitations,Intuition,Software,Collaborative network,Wireless sensor network
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
54
3
0010-4620
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
0
0.34
7
Authors
1
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Daniel D. Corkill1722467.03