Markov Decision Processes with Applications in Wireless Sensor Networks: A Survey

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) consist of autonomous and resource-limited devices. The devices cooperate to monitor one or more physical phenomena within an area of interest. WSNs operate as stochastic systems because of randomness in the monitored environments. For long service time and low maintenance cost, WSNs require adaptive and robust methods to address data exchange, topology formulation, resource and power optimization, sensing coverage and object detection, and security challenges. In these problems, sensor nodes are to make optimized decisions from a set of accessible strategies to achieve design goals. This survey reviews numerous applications of the Markov decision process (MDP) framework, a powerful decision-making tool to develop adaptive algorithms and protocols for WSNs. Furthermore, various solution methods are discussed and compared to serve as a guide for using MDPs in WSNs

Edge-Caching Wireless Networks: Performance Analysis and Optimization

Edge-caching has received much attention as an efficient technique to reduce delivery latency and network congestion during peak-traffic times by bringing data closer to end users. Existing works usually design caching algorithms separately from physical layer design. In this paper, we analyse edge-caching wireless networks by taking into account the caching capability when designing the signal transmission. Particularly, we investigate multi-layer caching where both base station (BS) and users are capable of storing content data in their local cache and analyse the performance of edge-caching wireless networks under two notable uncoded and coded caching strategies. Firstly, we propose a coded caching strategy that is applied to arbitrary values of cache size. The required backhaul and access rates are derived as a function of the BS and user cache size. Secondly, closed-form expressions for the system energy efficiency (EE) corresponding to the two caching methods are derived. Based on the derived formulas, the system EE is maximized via precoding vectors design and optimization while satisfying a predefined user request rate. Thirdly, two optimization problems are proposed to minimize the content delivery time for the two caching strategies. Finally, numerical results are presented to verify the effectiveness of the two caching methods.Comment: to appear in IEEE Trans. Wireless Commu

Energy Harvesting Wireless Communications: A Review of Recent Advances

This article summarizes recent contributions in the broad area of energy harvesting wireless communications. In particular, we provide the current state of the art for wireless networks composed of energy harvesting nodes, starting from the information-theoretic performance limits to transmission scheduling policies and resource allocation, medium access and networking issues. The emerging related area of energy transfer for self-sustaining energy harvesting wireless networks is considered in detail covering both energy cooperation aspects and simultaneous energy and information transfer. Various potential models with energy harvesting nodes at different network scales are reviewed as well as models for energy consumption at the nodes.Comment: To appear in the IEEE Journal of Selected Areas in Communications (Special Issue: Wireless Communications Powered by Energy Harvesting and Wireless Energy Transfer