A Robust Zero-Calibration RF-based Localization System for Realistic Environments

Due to the noisy indoor radio propagation channel, Radio Frequency (RF)-based location determination systems usually require a tedious calibration phase to construct an RF fingerprint of the area of interest. This fingerprint varies with the used mobile device, changes of the transmit power of smart access points (APs), and dynamic changes in the environment; requiring re-calibration of the area of interest; which reduces the technology ease of use. In this paper, we present IncVoronoi: a novel system that can provide zero-calibration accurate RF-based indoor localization that works in realistic environments. The basic idea is that the relative relation between the received signal strength from two APs at a certain location reflects the relative distance from this location to the respective APs. Building on this, IncVoronoi incrementally reduces the user ambiguity region based on refining the Voronoi tessellation of the area of interest. IncVoronoi also includes a number of modules to efficiently run in realtime as well as to handle practical deployment issues including the noisy wireless environment, obstacles in the environment, heterogeneous devices hardware, and smart APs. We have deployed IncVoronoi on different Android phones using the iBeacons technology in a university campus. Evaluation of IncVoronoi with a side-by-side comparison with traditional fingerprinting techniques shows that it can achieve a consistent median accuracy of 2.8m under different scenarios with a low beacon density of one beacon every 44m2. Compared to fingerprinting techniques, whose accuracy degrades by at least 156%, this accuracy comes with no training overhead and is robust to the different user devices, different transmit powers, and over temporal changes in the environment. This highlights the promise of IncVoronoi as a next generation indoor localization system.Comment: 9 pages, 13 figures, published in SECON 201

Space-Time Hierarchical-Graph Based Cooperative Localization in Wireless Sensor Networks

It has been shown that cooperative localization is capable of improving both the positioning accuracy and coverage in scenarios where the global positioning system (GPS) has a poor performance. However, due to its potentially excessive computational complexity, at the time of writing the application of cooperative localization remains limited in practice. In this paper, we address the efficient cooperative positioning problem in wireless sensor networks. A space-time hierarchical-graph based scheme exhibiting fast convergence is proposed for localizing the agent nodes. In contrast to conventional methods, agent nodes are divided into different layers with the aid of the space-time hierarchical-model and their positions are estimated gradually. In particular, an information propagation rule is conceived upon considering the quality of positional information. According to the rule, the information always propagates from the upper layers to a certain lower layer and the message passing process is further optimized at each layer. Hence, the potential error propagation can be mitigated. Additionally, both position estimation and position broadcasting are carried out by the sensor nodes. Furthermore, a sensor activation mechanism is conceived, which is capable of significantly reducing both the energy consumption and the network traffic overhead incurred by the localization process. The analytical and numerical results provided demonstrate the superiority of our space-time hierarchical-graph based cooperative localization scheme over the benchmarking schemes considered.Comment: 14 pages, 15 figures, 4 tables, accepted to appear on IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing, Sept. 201

A survey of localization in wireless sensor network

Localization is one of the key techniques in wireless sensor network. The location estimation methods can be classified into target/source localization and node self-localization. In target localization, we mainly introduce the energy-based method. Then we investigate the node self-localization methods. Since the widespread adoption of the wireless sensor network, the localization methods are different in various applications. And there are several challenges in some special scenarios. In this paper, we present a comprehensive survey of these challenges: localization in non-line-of-sight, node selection criteria for localization in energy-constrained network, scheduling the sensor node to optimize the tradeoff between localization performance and energy consumption, cooperative node localization, and localization algorithm in heterogeneous network. Finally, we introduce the evaluation criteria for localization in wireless sensor network

Coverage Protocols for Wireless Sensor Networks: Review and Future Directions

The coverage problem in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) can be generally defined as a measure of how effectively a network field is monitored by its sensor nodes. This problem has attracted a lot of interest over the years and as a result, many coverage protocols were proposed. In this survey, we first propose a taxonomy for classifying coverage protocols in WSNs. Then, we classify the coverage protocols into three categories (i.e. coverage aware deployment protocols, sleep scheduling protocols for flat networks, and cluster-based sleep scheduling protocols) based on the network stage where the coverage is optimized. For each category, relevant protocols are thoroughly reviewed and classified based on the adopted coverage techniques. Finally, we discuss open issues (and recommend future directions to resolve them) associated with the design of realistic coverage protocols. Issues such as realistic sensing models, realistic energy consumption models, realistic connectivity models and sensor localization are covered

Sparse Localization with a Mobile Beacon Based on LU Decomposition in Wireless Sensor Networks

Node localization is the core in wireless sensor network. It can be solved by powerful beacons, which are equipped with global positioning system devices to know their location information. In this article, we present a novel sparse localization approach with a mobile beacon based on LU decomposition. Our scheme firstly translates node localization problem into a 1-sparse vector recovery problem by establishing sparse localization model. Then, LU decomposition pre-processing is adopted to solve the problem that measurement matrix does not meet the re¬stricted isometry property. Later, the 1-sparse vector can be exactly recovered by compressive sensing. Finally, as the 1-sparse vector is approximate sparse, weighted Cen¬troid scheme is introduced to accurately locate the node. Simulation and analysis show that our scheme has better localization performance and lower requirement for the mobile beacon than MAP+GC, MAP-M, and MAP-M&N schemes. In addition, the obstacles and DOI have little effect on the novel scheme, and it has great localization performance under low SNR, thus, the scheme proposed is robust

Machine Learning in Wireless Sensor Networks: Algorithms, Strategies, and Applications

Wireless sensor networks monitor dynamic environments that change rapidly over time. This dynamic behavior is either caused by external factors or initiated by the system designers themselves. To adapt to such conditions, sensor networks often adopt machine learning techniques to eliminate the need for unnecessary redesign. Machine learning also inspires many practical solutions that maximize resource utilization and prolong the lifespan of the network. In this paper, we present an extensive literature review over the period 2002-2013 of machine learning methods that were used to address common issues in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). The advantages and disadvantages of each proposed algorithm are evaluated against the corresponding problem. We also provide a comparative guide to aid WSN designers in developing suitable machine learning solutions for their specific application challenges.Comment: Accepted for publication in IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorial