A mobile wireless sensor network (MWSN)T. Hayes and F.H. Ali. 2016
"Mobile Wireless Sensor Networks: Applications and Routing Protocols"
Handbook of Research on Next Generation Mobile Communications Systems. IGI Global. . pp. 256–292. can simply be defined as a

wireless sensor network Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) refer to networks of spatially dispersed and dedicated sensors that monitor and record the physical conditions of the environment and forward the collected data to a central location. WSNs can measure environmental c ...

(WSN) in which the

sensor node A sensor node, also known as a mote (chiefly in North America), is a node in a sensor network that is capable of performing some processing, gathering sensory information and communicating with other connected nodes in the network. A mote is a no ...

s are mobile. MWSNs are a smaller, emerging field of research in contrast to their well-established predecessor. MWSNs are much more versatile than static sensor networks as they can be deployed in any scenario and cope with rapid

topology In mathematics, topology (from the Greek language, Greek words , and ) is concerned with the properties of a mathematical object, geometric object that are preserved under Continuous function, continuous Deformation theory, deformations, such ...

changes. However, many of their applications are similar, such as environment monitoring or

surveillance Surveillance is the monitoring of behavior, many activities, or information for the purpose of information gathering, influencing, managing or directing. This can include observation from a distance by means of electronic equipment, such as c ...

. Commonly, the nodes consist of a

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

transceiver In radio communication, a transceiver is an electronic device which is a combination of a radio ''trans''mitter and a re''ceiver'', hence the name. It can both transmit and receive radio waves using an antenna, for communication purposes. The ...

and a

microcontroller A microcontroller (MCU for ''microcontroller unit'', often also MC, UC, or μC) is a small computer on a single VLSI integrated circuit (IC) chip. A microcontroller contains one or more CPUs (processor cores) along with memory and programmable i ...

battery Battery most often refers to: * Electric battery, a device that provides electrical power * Battery (crime), a crime involving unlawful physical contact Battery may also refer to: Energy source *Automotive battery, a device to provide power t ...

, as well as some kind of

sensor A sensor is a device that produces an output signal for the purpose of sensing a physical phenomenon. In the broadest definition, a sensor is a device, module, machine, or subsystem that detects events or changes in its environment and sends ...

for detecting

light Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that can be perceived by the human eye. Visible light is usually defined as having wavelengths in the range of 400–700 nanometres (nm), corresponding to frequencies of 750–420 tera ...

heat In thermodynamics, heat is defined as the form of energy crossing the boundary of a thermodynamic system by virtue of a temperature difference across the boundary. A thermodynamic system does not ''contain'' heat. Nevertheless, the term is al ...

humidity Humidity is the concentration of water vapor present in the air. Water vapor, the gaseous state of water, is generally invisible to the human eye. Humidity indicates the likelihood for precipitation, dew, or fog to be present. Humidity depe ...

temperature Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measured with a thermometer. Thermometers are calibrated in various temperature scales that historically have relied o ...

, etc.

Challenges

Broadly speaking, there are two sets of challenges in MWSNs; hardware and environment. The main hardware constraints are limited battery power and low cost requirements. The limited power means that it's important for the nodes to be energy efficient. Price limitations often demand low complexity algorithms for simpler microcontrollers and use of only a

simplex In geometry, a simplex (plural: simplexes or simplices) is a generalization of the notion of a triangle or tetrahedron to arbitrary dimensions. The simplex is so-named because it represents the simplest possible polytope in any given dimension. ...

radio. The major environmental factors are the shared medium and varying topology. The shared medium dictates that channel access must be regulated in some way. This is often done using a

medium access control In IEEE 802 LAN/MAN standards, the medium access control (MAC, also called media access control) sublayer is the layer that controls the hardware responsible for interaction with the wired, optical or wireless transmission medium. The MAC sublay ...

(MAC) scheme, such as

carrier-sense multiple access Carrier-sense multiple access (CSMA) is a medium access control (MAC) protocol in which a node verifies the absence of other Network traffic, traffic before Transmission (telecommunications), transmitting on a shared transmission medium, such as a ...

(CSMA),

frequency-division multiple access Frequency-division multiple access (FDMA) is a channel access method used in some multiple-access protocols. FDMA allows multiple users to send data through a single communication channel, such as a coaxial cable or microwave beam, by dividing ...

(FDMA) or

code-division multiple access Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communication ...

(CDMA). The varying topology of the network comes from the mobility of nodes, which means that multihop paths from the sensors to the sink are not stable.

Standards

Currently there is no standard for MWSNs, so often protocols from MANETs are borrowed, such as

Associativity-Based Routing #REDIRECT Associativity-based routing {{Rcatshell, {{R from move {{R from alternative capitalization ...

(AR),

Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector Routing Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV) Routing is a routing protocol for mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) and other wireless ad hoc networks. It was jointly developed in July 2003 in Nokia Research Center, University of California, Santa Barbara an ...

(AODV),

Dynamic Source Routing Dynamic Source Routing (DSR) is a routing protocol for wireless mesh networks. It is similar to AODV in that it forms a route on-demand when a transmitting node requests one. However, it uses source routing instead of relying on the routing tab ...

(DSR) and Greedy Perimeter Stateless Routing (GPSR). MANET protocols are preferred as they are able to work in mobile environments, whereas WSN protocols often aren't suitable.

Topology

Topology selection plays an important role in routing because the network topology decides the transmission path of the data packets to reach the proper destination. Here, all the topologies (Flat / Unstructured, cluster, tree, chain and hybrid topology) are not feasible for reliable data transmission on sensor nodes mobility. Instead of single topology, hybrid topology plays a vital role in data collection, and the performance is good. Hybrid topology management schemes include the Cluster Independent Data Collection Tree ( CIDT). and the Velocity Energy-efficient and Link-aware Cluster-Tree ( VELCT); both have been proposed for mobile wireless sensor networks (MWSNs).

Routing

Since there is no fixed topology in these networks, one of the greatest challenges is routing data from its source to the destination. Generally these routing protocols draw inspiration from two fields; WSNs and

mobile ad hoc network A wireless ad hoc network (WANET) or mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a decentralized type of wireless network. The network is ad hoc because it does not rely on a pre-existing infrastructure, such as routers in wired networks or access points ...

s (MANETs). WSN routing protocols provide the required functionality but cannot handle the high frequency of topology changes. Whereas, MANET routing protocols can deal with mobility in the network but they are designed for two way communication, which in sensor networks is often not required. Protocols designed specifically for MWSNs are almost always multihop and sometimes adaptations of existing protocols. For example, Angle-based Dynamic Source Routing (ADSR), is an adaptation of the wireless mesh network protocol

(DSR) for MWSNs. ADSR uses location information to work out the angle between the node intending to transmit, potential forwarding nodes and the sink. This is then used to insure that packets are always forwarded towards the sink. Also, Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy (LEACH) protocol for WSNs has been adapted to LEACH-M (LEACH-Mobile), for MWSNs. The main issue with hierarchical protocols is that mobile nodes are prone to frequently switching between clusters, which can cause large amounts of overhead from the nodes having to regularly re-associate themselves with different cluster heads. Another popular routing technique is to utilise location information from a

GPS The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a Radionavigation-satellite service, satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of t ...

module attached to the nodes. This can be seen in protocols such as Zone Based Routing (ZBR), which defines clusters geographically and uses the location information to keep nodes updated with the cluster they're in. In comparison, Geographically Opportunistic Routing (GOR), is a flat protocol that divides the network area into grids and then uses the location information to opportunistically forward data as far as possible in each hop. Multipath protocols provide a robust mechanism for routing and therefore seem like a promising direction for MWSN routing protocols. One such protocol is the query based Data Centric Braided Multipath (DCBM). Furthermore, Robust Ad-hoc Sensor Routing (RASeR) and Location Aware Sensor Routing (LASeR) are two protocols that are designed specifically for high speed MWSN applications, such as those that incorporate UAVs. They both take advantage of multipath routing, which is facilitated by a 'blind forwarding' technique. Blind forwarding simply allows the transmitting node to broadcast a packet to its neighbors, it is then the responsibility of the receiving nodes to decide whether they should forward the packet or drop it. The decision of whether to forward a packet or not is made using a network-wide gradient metric, such that the values of the transmitting and receiving nodes are compared to determine which is closer to the sink. The key difference between RASeR and LASeR is in the way they maintain their gradient metrics; RASeR uses the regular transmission of small beacon packets, in which nodes broadcast their current gradient. Whereas, LASeR relies on taking advantage of geographical location information that is already present on the mobile sensor node, which is likely the case in many applications.

Medium access control

There are three types of medium access control (MAC) techniques: based on time division,

frequency division A frequency divider, also called a clock divider or scaler or prescaler, is a circuit that takes an input signal of a frequency, f_, and generates an output signal of a frequency: : f_ = \frac where n is an integer. Phase-locked loop frequency ...

and code division. Due to the relative ease of implementation, the most common choice of MAC is time-division-based, closely related to the popular

CSMA/CA Carrier-sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA/CA) in computer networking, is a network multiple access method in which carrier sensing is used, but nodes attempt to avoid collisions by beginning transmission only after the channel ...

MAC. The vast majority of MAC protocols that have been designed with MWSNs in mind, are adapted from existing WSN MACs and focus on low power consumption, duty-cycled schemes.

Validation

Protocols designed for MWSNs are usually validated with the use of either analytical, simulation or experimental results. Detailed analytical results are mathematical in nature and can provide good approximations of protocol behaviour. Simulations can be performed using software such as

OPNET OPNET Technologies, Inc. was a software business that provided performance management for computer networks A computer network is a set of computers sharing resources located on or provided by network nodes. The computers use common comm ...

, NetSim and ns2 and is the most common method of validation. Simulations can provide close approximations to the real behaviour of a protocol under various scenarios. Physical experiments are the most expensive to perform and, unlike the other two methods, no assumptions need to be made. This makes them the most reliable form of information, when determining how a protocol will perform under certain conditions.

Applications

The advantage of allowing the sensors to be mobile increases the number of applications beyond those for which static WSNs are used. Sensors can be attached to a number of platforms: * People * Animals * Autonomous Vehicles * Unmanned Vehicles * Manned Vehicles In order to characterise the requirements of an application, it can be categorised as either constant monitoring, event monitoring, constant mapping or event mapping. Constant type applications are time-based and as such data is generated periodically, whereas event type applications are event drive and so data is only generated when an event occurs. The monitoring applications are constantly running over a period of time, whereas mapping applications are usually deployed once in order to assess the current state of a phenomenon. Examples of applications include health monitoring, which may include heart rate, blood pressure etc. This can be constant, in the case of a patient in a hospital, or event driven in the case of a wearable sensor that automatically reports your location to an ambulance team in the case of an emergency. Animals can have sensors attached to them in order to track their movements for migration patterns, feeding habits or other research purposes. Sensors may also be attached to

unmanned aerial vehicles An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew, or passengers on board. UAVs are a component of an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which includes adding a ground-based controller ...

(UAVs) for surveillance or environment mapping.B. White et al. 2008
Contaminant Cloud Boundary Monitoring Using Network of UAV Sensors
IEEE Sensors Journal, vol. 8, no. 10, pp. 1681–1692. In the case of autonomous UAV aided search and rescue, this would be considered an event mapping application, since the UAVs are deployed to search an area but will only transmit data back when a person has been found.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mobile Wireless Sensor Network Wireless sensor network