Wireless sensor placement for reliable and efficient data collection

Abstract

Sensors can be paired with radio units and deployed to form a wireless ad-hoc sensor network. Actual deployments must consider the coverage that can be achieved with a given number of sensors: this coverage varies with the range of the radios and the maximum allowable distance between any point in the area and the nearest sensor. Deployments must also preserve connectivity in spite of possible failure or energy depletion in a subset of the units. This paper presents and analyzes a variety of regular deployment topologies, including circular and star deployments as well as deployments in square, triangular, and hexagonal grids.