100 research outputs found
Object tracking sensor networks in smart cities: Taxonomy, architecture, applications, research challenges and future directions
The development of pervasive communication devices and the emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) have acted as an essential part in the feasibility of smart city initiatives. Wireless sensor network (WSN) as a key enabling technology in IoT offers the potential for cities to get smatter. WSNs gained tremendous attention during the recent years because of their rising number of applications that enables remote monitoring and tracking in smart cities. One of the most exciting applications of WSNs in smart cities is detection, monitoring, and tracking which is referred to as object tracking sensor networks (OTSN). The adaptation of OTSN into urban cities brought new exciting challenges for reaching the goal of future smart cities. Such challenges focus primarily on problems related to active monitoring and tracking in smart cities. In this paper, we present the essential characteristics of OTSN, monitoring and tracking application used with the content of smart city. Moreover, we discussed the taxonomy of OTSN along with analysis and comparison. Furthermore, research challenges are investigated concerning energy reservation, object detection, object speed, accuracy in tracking, sensor node collaboration, data aggregation and object recovery position estimation. This review can serve as a benchmark for researchers for future development of smart cities in the context of OTSN. Lastly, we provide future research direction
Biologically inspired, self organizing communication networks.
PhDThe problem of energy-efficient, reliable, accurate and self-organized target tracking in
Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) is considered for sensor nodes with limited physical
resources and abrupt manoeuvring mobile targets. A biologically inspired, adaptive
multi-sensor scheme is proposed for collaborative Single Target Tracking (STT) and
Multi-Target Tracking (MTT). Behavioural data obtained while tracking the targets
including the targets’ previous locations is recorded as metadata to compute the target
sampling interval, target importance and local monitoring interval so that tracking
continuity and energy-efficiency are improved. The subsequent sensor groups that track
the targets are selected proactively according to the information associated with the
predicted target location probability such that the overall tracking performance is
optimized or nearly-optimized. One sensor node from each of the selected groups is
elected as a main node for management operations so that energy efficiency and load
balancing are improved. A decision algorithm is proposed to allow the “conflict” nodes
that are located in the sensing areas of more than one target at the same time to decide
their preferred target according to the target importance and the distance to the target. A
tracking recovery mechanism is developed to provide the tracking reliability in the
event of target loss.
The problem of task mapping and scheduling in WSNs is also considered. A
Biological Independent Task Allocation (BITA) algorithm and a Biological Task
Mapping and Scheduling (BTMS) algorithm are developed to execute an application
using a group of sensor nodes. BITA, BTMS and the functional specialization of the
sensor groups in target tracking are all inspired from biological behaviours of
differentiation in zygote formation.
Simulation results show that compared with other well-known schemes, the
proposed tracking, task mapping and scheduling schemes can provide a significant
improvement in energy-efficiency and computational time, whilst maintaining
acceptable accuracy and seamless tracking, even with abrupt manoeuvring targets.Queen Mary university of London full Scholarshi
Human mobility monitoring in very low resolution visual sensor network
This paper proposes an automated system for monitoring mobility patterns using a network of very low resolution visual sensors (30 30 pixels). The use of very low resolution sensors reduces privacy concern, cost, computation requirement and power consumption. The core of our proposed system is a robust people tracker that uses low resolution videos provided by the visual sensor network. The distributed processing architecture of our tracking system allows all image processing tasks to be done on the digital signal controller in each visual sensor. In this paper, we experimentally show that reliable tracking of people is possible using very low resolution imagery. We also compare the performance of our tracker against a state-of-the-art tracking method and show that our method outperforms. Moreover, the mobility statistics of tracks such as total distance traveled and average speed derived from trajectories are compared with those derived from ground truth given by Ultra-Wide Band sensors. The results of this comparison show that the trajectories from our system are accurate enough to obtain useful mobility statistics
Context Exploitation in Data Fusion
Complex and dynamic environments constitute a challenge for existing tracking algorithms. For this reason, modern solutions are trying to utilize any available information which could help to constrain, improve or explain the measurements. So called Context Information (CI) is understood as information that surrounds an element of interest, whose knowledge may help understanding the (estimated) situation and also in reacting to that situation. However, context discovery and exploitation are still largely unexplored research topics.
Until now, the context has been extensively exploited as a parameter in system and measurement models which led to the development of numerous approaches for the linear or non-linear constrained estimation and target tracking. More specifically, the spatial or static context is the most common source of the ambient information, i.e. features, utilized for recursive enhancement of the state variables either in the prediction or the measurement update of the filters. In the case of multiple model estimators, context can not only be related to the state but also to a certain mode of the filter. Common practice for multiple model scenarios is to represent states and context as a joint distribution of Gaussian mixtures. These approaches are commonly referred as the join tracking and classification. Alternatively, the usefulness of context was also demonstrated in aiding the measurement data association. Process of formulating a hypothesis, which assigns a particular measurement to the track, is traditionally governed by the empirical knowledge of the noise characteristics of sensors and operating environment, i.e. probability of detection, false alarm, clutter noise, which can be further enhanced by conditioning on context.
We believe that interactions between the environment and the object could be classified into actions, activities and intents, and formed into structured graphs with contextual links translated into arcs. By learning the environment model we will be able to make prediction on the target\u2019s future actions based on its past observation. Probability of target future action could be utilized in the fusion process to adjust tracker confidence on measurements. By incorporating contextual knowledge of the environment, in the form of a likelihood function, in the filter measurement update step, we have been able to reduce uncertainties of the tracking solution and improve the consistency of the track. The promising results demonstrate that the fusion of CI brings a significant performance improvement in comparison to the regular tracking approaches
Recent Advances in Indoor Localization Systems and Technologies
Despite the enormous technical progress seen in the past few years, the maturity of indoor localization technologies has not yet reached the level of GNSS solutions. The 23 selected papers in this book present the recent advances and new developments in indoor localization systems and technologies, propose novel or improved methods with increased performance, provide insight into various aspects of quality control, and also introduce some unorthodox positioning methods
Sailbot 2017-2018
The goal of this MQP was to build and program a robot capable of competing in the 2018 International Robotic Sailing Competition (IRSC), also known as Sailbot. This project utilized existing research on control and design of autonomous sailboats, and built on lessons learned from the last two years of WPI’s Sailbot entries. The final product of this MQP was a more reliable, easier to control, and more innovative design than last year’s event-winning boat
Sailbot 2017-2018
The goal of this MQP was to build and program a robot capable of competing in the 2018 International Robotic Sailing Competition (IRSC), also known as Sailbot. This project utilized existing research on control and design of autonomous sailboats, and built on lessons learned from the last two years of WPIs Sailbot entries. The final product of this MQP was a more reliable, easier to control, and more innovative design than last years event-winning boat
Sailbot 2017-2018
The goal of this MQP was to build and program a robot capable of competing in the 2018 International Robotic Sailing Competition (IRSC), also known as Sailbot. This project utilized existing research on control and design of autonomous sailboats, and built on lessons learned from the last two years of WPIs Sailbot entries. The final product of this MQP was a more reliable, easier to control, and more innovative design than last years event-winning boat
Sailbot 2017-2018
The goal of this MQP was to build and program a robot capable of competing in the 2018 International Robotic Sailing Competition (IRSC), also known as Sailbot. This project utilized existing research on control and design of autonomous sailboats, and built on lessons learned from the last two years of WPIÂs Sailbot entries. The final product of this MQP was a more reliable, easier to control, and more innovative design than last yearÂs event-winning boat
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