Tiling-Based Localization Scheme for Sensor Networks Using a Single Beacon

Abstract

We propose and evaluate a new localization protocol for sensor networks. Contrary to most current localization schemes, this protocol relies on the existence of only a single beacon node. The main idea is to hypothetically tile the deployment area with identical equilateral geometric shapes (e.g. hexagons, triangles... etc). Tiling should be such that the positions of the centers of these shapes can be easily computed relative to the position of the beacon node. After that, the set of nodes that are as close as possible to the centers of these shapes is determined. We refer to these nodes as central nodes. Basically, the positions of these central nodes can be approximated by the positions of the centers of the geometric shapes which can be calculated mathematically. These central nodes can be treated as beacons and the positions of all non-central nodes can be estimated using any range-free protocol (e.g. the centroid). Simulation results show that the accuracy of the proposed protocol is comparable to the accuracy of current localization protocols especially near the beacon node. In addition to this, the achieved localization accuracy increases significantly as the network density increases.