Localization for Drifting Restricted Floating Ocean Sensor Networks

TLDR

Deploying wireless sensor networks in the ocean is difficult due to harsh conditions and significant node mobility. The authors propose drifting restricted floating ocean sensor networks (DR‑OSNs) and a localization scheme (LDSN) that enables long‑term maritime surveillance without underwater anchor nodes. The localization process comprises three stages: self‑moored node localization (SML) to anchor underwater nodes, underwater sensor localization (USD) using those anchors, and floating‑node localization algorithm (FLA) for GPS‑free floating nodes. Extensive simulations show that LDSN achieves high localization accuracy and is an effective scheme for DR‑OSNs.

Abstract

Deploying wireless sensor networks in the ocean poses many challenges due to the harsh conditions of the ocean and the nonnegligible node mobility. In this paper, we propose hybrid ocean sensor networks called drifting restricted floating ocean sensor networks (DR-OSNs) for long-term maritime surveillance monitoring tasks, which combines both the advantages of wireless sensor networks and underwater wireless acoustic sensor networks. We present a localization scheme termed localization for double-head maritime sensor networks (LDSN) for DR-OSNs, which leverages the unique characteristics of DR-OSNs to establish the whole localization system after the network is deployed from a plane or a ship, and it does not need the presence of designated anchor nodes deployed underwater. The whole localization process consists of three steps with algorithms self-moored node localization (SML), underwater sensor localization (USD), and floating-node localization algorithm (FLA). The first step is for the super group nodes to localize their underwater moored nodes via an SML algorithm by leveraging the free-drifting movement of their surface nodes. Once the moored nodes in the super group nodes have localized themselves, they turn into anchor nodes underwater. Thus, in the second step, with the help of these new anchor nodes, the unlocalized underwater moored nodes use the USD algorithm to localize their positions. In the last step, when the free-drifting floating nodes without a Global Positioning System (GPS) module need to know their instant position, they apply the FLA to figure out their position. We conduct extensive simulations to evaluate the scheme, with the results indicating that LDSN achieves high localization accuracy and is an effective localization scheme for DR-OSNs.