Collaborative Research: SENSORS: Energy Efficient Communication in Sensor Networks

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ABSTRACT0329794Lixin GaoJie WuU of Massachusetts AmherstSpurred by the fast increasing capabilities and declining costs of computing and communication devices, it becomes increasingly viable to embed sensors in physical devices and link these sensors through wireless networks. These sensor networks can be deployed for a wide range of applications that can improve quality of life, and even save lives. These applications include healthcare (e.g., health monitoring and coordination among doctors and nurses), aircraft flight control, weather forecasting, home appliance control, and protection against bioterrorism. One of the key challenges in the deployment of sensor networks is how to prolong the lifetime of the networks. Sensor networks will stress power sources because of the their need for long operating lifetimes and high energy density. Therefore, energy efficiency is critical for the wide deployment of sensor networks. The investigators study energy management techniques for sensor networks. The key idea is to take advantage of the physical layer design that facilitates the combining of partial information. A node can receive several partial signals and combine these signals to retrieve the complete signal. This is referred to as hitchhiking. Hitchhiking can potentially conserve energy for transmitting data in sensor networks. By the effective use of partial signals, a packet can be delivered with less nodes and/or less transmission power at each node. The investigators will systematically study the energy management techniques for sensor networks as follows. First, the investigators will study the physical layer design of hitchhiking. Second, the investigators will study power control for broadcast networks and unicast networks. Third, the investigators will study power saving protocols to reduce the energy consumption for idle modes.