Application of multiple-wireless to a visual localisation system for emergency services

Abstract—In this paper we discuss the application of multiplewireless technology to a practical context-enhanced service system called ViewNet. ViewNet develops technologies to support enhanced coordination and cooperation between operation teams in the emergency services and the police. Distributed localisation of users and mapping of environments implemented over a secure wireless network enables teams of operatives to search and map an incident area rapidly and in full coordination with each other and with a control centre. Sensing is based on fusing absolute positioning systems (UWB and GPS) with relative localisation and mapping from on-body or handheld vision and inertial sensors. This paper focuses on the case for multiple-wireless capabilities in such a system and the benefits it can provide. We describe our work of developing a software API to support both WLAN and TETRA in ViewNet. It also provides a basis for incorporating future wireless technologies into ViewNet. I

Sensor Networks for Monitoring Metro-de-Medellín System Infrastructure

Structural health monitoring systems rely on electronic instrumentation and telemetry for improving maintenance tasks, preventing catastrophic failures and following the behavior of critical variables for infrastructure works such as tunnels, highways, bridges and buildings. A proposal for the development of sensor networks for monitoring Metro-de-Medellín system infrastructure is presented. The adopted approach is based on the deployment of generic sensing units that can operate either individually or by constituting wireless personal area networks un-der the MiWi P2P protocol from Microchip.  Different transceivers can be added to monitoring units that can act as gateways in order to allow collected data reach other networks, ranging from local area to metropolitan area coverage. Several sensors, digital and analog, can be attached to the generic units depending on the particular requirements of specific situations and monitoring locations. The results obtained from performed tests and the options considered for graphical user interfaces are also presented.Keywords: MiWi Protocol, Structural Health Monitoring, Short Data Service, Terrestrial Trunked Radio, Wireless Sensor Networks

A Survey on Multihop Ad Hoc Networks for Disaster Response Scenarios

Disastrous events are one of the most challenging applications of multihop ad hoc networks due to possible damages of existing telecommunication infrastructure.The deployed cellular communication infrastructure might be partially or completely destroyed after a natural disaster. Multihop ad hoc communication is an interesting alternative to deal with the lack of communications in disaster scenarios. They have evolved since their origin, leading to differentad hoc paradigms such as MANETs, VANETs, DTNs, or WSNs.This paper presents a survey on multihop ad hoc network paradigms for disaster scenarios.It highlights their applicability to important tasks in disaster relief operations. More specifically, the paper reviews the main work found in the literature, which employed ad hoc networks in disaster scenarios.In addition, it discusses the open challenges and the future research directions for each different ad hoc paradigm

Towards UAV Assisted 5G Public Safety Network

Ensuring ubiquitous mission-critical public safety communications (PSC) to all the first responders in the public safety network is crucial at an emergency site. The first responders heavily rely on mission-critical PSC to save lives, property, and national infrastructure during a natural or human-made emergency. The recent advancements in LTE/LTE-Advanced/5G mobile technologies supported by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) have great potential to revolutionize PSC. However, limited spectrum allocation for LTE-based PSC demands improved channel capacity and spectral efficiency. An additional challenge in designing an LTE-based PSC network is achieving at least 95% coverage of the geographical area and human population with broadband rates. The coverage requirement and efficient spectrum use in the PSC network can be realized through the dense deployment of small cells (both terrestrial and aerial). However, there are several challenges with the dense deployment of small cells in an air-ground heterogeneous network (AG-HetNet). The main challenges which are addressed in this research work are integrating UAVs as both aerial user and aerial base-stations, mitigating inter-cell interference, capacity and coverage enhancements, and optimizing deployment locations of aerial base-stations. First, LTE signals were investigated using NS-3 simulation and software-defined radio experiment to gain knowledge on the quality of service experienced by the user equipment (UE). Using this understanding, a two-tier LTE-Advanced AG-HetNet with macro base-stations and unmanned aerial base-stations (UABS) is designed, while considering time-domain inter-cell interference coordination techniques. We maximize the capacity of this AG-HetNet in case of a damaged PSC infrastructure by jointly optimizing the inter-cell interference parameters and UABS locations using a meta-heuristic genetic algorithm (GA) and the brute-force technique. Finally, considering the latest specifications in 3GPP, a more realistic three-tier LTE-Advanced AG-HetNet is proposed with macro base-stations, pico base-stations, and ground UEs as terrestrial nodes and UABS and aerial UEs as aerial nodes. Using meta-heuristic techniques such as GA and elitist harmony search algorithm based on the GA, the critical network elements such as energy efficiency, inter-cell interference parameters, and UABS locations are all jointly optimized to maximize the capacity and coverage of the AG-HetNet

Using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for Wireless Localization in Search and Rescue

This thesis presents how unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) can successfully assist in search and rescue (SAR) operations using wireless localization. The zone-grid to partition to capture/detect WiFi probe requests follows the concepts found in Search Theory Method. The UAV has attached a sensor, e.g., WiFi sniffer, to capture/detect the WiFi probes from victims or lost people’s smartphones. Applying the Random-Forest based machine learning algorithm, an estimation of the user\u27s location is determined with a 81.8% accuracy. UAV technology has shown limitations in the navigational performance and limited flight time. Procedures to optimize these limitations are presented. Additionally, how the UAV is maneuvered during flight is analyzed, considering different SAR flight patterns and Li-Po battery consumption rates of the UAV. Results show that controlling the UAV by remote-controll detected the most probes, but it is less power efficient compared to control it autonomously

Innovative Wireless Localization Techniques and Applications

Innovative methodologies for the wireless localization of users and related applications are addressed in this thesis. In last years, the widespread diffusion of pervasive wireless communication (e.g., Wi-Fi) and global localization services (e.g., GPS) has boosted the interest and the research on location information and services. Location-aware applications are becoming fundamental to a growing number of consumers (e.g., navigation, advertising, seamless user interaction with smart places), private and public institutions in the fields of energy efficiency, security, safety, fleet management, emergency response. In this context, the position of the user - where is often more valuable for deploying services of interest than the identity of the user itself - who. In detail, opportunistic approaches based on the analysis of electromagnetic field indicators (i.e., received signal strength and channel state information) for the presence detection, the localization, the tracking and the posture recognition of cooperative and non-cooperative (device-free) users in indoor environments are proposed and validated in real world test sites. The methodologies are designed to exploit existing wireless infrastructures and commodity devices without any hardware modification. In outdoor environments, global positioning technologies are already available in commodity devices and vehicles, the research and knowledge transfer activities are actually focused on the design and validation of algorithms and systems devoted to support decision makers and operators for increasing efficiency, operations security, and management of large fleets as well as localized sensed information in order to gain situation awareness. In this field, a decision support system for emergency response and Civil Defense assets management (i.e., personnel and vehicles equipped with TETRA mobile radio) is described in terms of architecture and results of two-years of experimental validation