Everything You Always

Wanted to Know About

Sensor/Actuator Networks
But Were Afraid to Ask
 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs)
● Definition: WSN is a computer network composed of
many, spatially distributed small devices that use sensors
to monitor environment at different locations.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Hardware
Types of sensors nodes:
• Now:
– Berkeley’s Motes
– Shockfish's TinyNodes
– Moteiv's Telos
– UCLA’s iBadge
– Berkeley Piconodes
– Harvard's Pluto Motes
– RFIDs
– …
• Future (10 years):
– Smart dust
– ...

Price per sensor node

• Now: ~ 100$
• Future (10 years): ~ <1 $

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 What is inside?
• Components:
– Sensing Component: temperature, light, vibration, sound, radiation - sensor
– Data Processing Component: CPU
– Communicating Component: RF Chip
– Power Supply: Battery

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 What Can We Sense?
• temperature
• humidity
• vehicular movement
• lightning condition
• pressure
• soil makeup
• noise levels
• the presence or absence of certain kinds of objects
• mechanical stress levels on attached objects
• the current characteristics such as speed, direction, and
size of an object

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Applications
Environmental applications
• Forest fire detection
• Biocomplexity mapping of the environment
• Flood detection
• Precision agriculture

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Applications
Health applications
• Telemonitoring of human physiological
data
• Tracking and monitoring patients and
doctors inside a hospital
• Drug administration in hospitals

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Applications
Home applications

• Home automation
• Smart environment

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Applications
Other commercial applications
• Environmental control in office buildings
• Interactive museums
• Managing inventory control
• Vehicle tracking and detection
• Detecting and monitoring car thefts

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Why WSNs Are So Special?
• Sensor nodes are limited in power, computational
capacities, and memory.
• The WSN topology might change very rapidly
• Sensor networks mainly use broadcast and peer-
to-peer communication
• Potentially large-scale networks comprising of
thousands of sensor nodes
• Distributed collaborative computing : In-Network
Processing
• Sensor nodes are prone to failures.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Surge

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Sensor + Actuator
• Physical world has to be sensed and controlled
• Sensors: Data Sources (reactive) Report the state of
the Environment
• Actuators: Data Sinks (reactive) Set the state of the
Environment
• Controllers: Data processing (active component)

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks
(WSANs)

• WSAN monitors and controls the environment

• In case of WSAN the consumer of the
information is inside the network
• Example of an Application : any distributed
control system supported by WSAN

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 SmartPark
Motivation:
• improve mobility in the urban area by finding free parking spots for
drivers willing to park
• decrease the risk of possible accidents and pollution
• eliminate road rage
Problem statement:
• how to help drivers find parking spaces?
• how to guide them with turn-by-turn instructions?
Solution:
• a distributed control system supported by WSAN
• an open system which can evolve

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Nothing New?
• SO/TC204 Transport Information and Control Systems
(TICS)
www.sae.org/technicalcommittees/tc204.htm
• San Francisco Bay Area Rapid District - “Smart Parking “
www.bart.gov/guide/parking/
● Vehicle Information and Communication System (VICS)
www.vics.or.jp

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 SmartPark Architecture
• Parking Sensors:
– sense the parking state, actuate by guiding
vehicles
• Wireless Guidance Devices:
– sense the vehicle state, actuate by guiding
vehicles
• Both might act as controllers.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 SmartPark

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Advantages
• SmartPark advantages:
– Low cost:
• Self-contained, self-powered, small form factor
• No need for GPS, infrastructure, map database, etc.
– Robust:
• Simple and cheap to over-provision for redundancy
– Simple deployment:
• Unlicensed spectrum: no red tape, no licensing fees
• No or minimal configuration for new nodes
– Simple maintenance:
• No need for repairs, simply replace low-cost sensors
• Sensor network auto-configures & adapts

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 SmartPark – Open Issues
• location and tracking
• navigation
• efficient event propagation
• energy efficiency
• cost
• collision-free parking spot allocation
• scalability, robustness and modularity
• privacy and security
• and many more ...

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Tracking
• Why it is important?
– The system has to know where the vehicle is in
order to guide it efficiently to a given parking
spot
– Dynamic road topology discovery performed
by parking sensors
– Useful also for possible extensions of
SmartPark e.g. accident warning.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Tracking
• Why it is challenging?
– Radio propagation patterns are not like circles
– Uncertainty due to the not precise location.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Tracking
• How to solve this problem?
– No GPS
– Centralized vs. decentralized approach
– Minimize the cost of communication (only V2S
communication) and the cost of computation (no
complex algorithms)

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Tracking

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Outline
• Introduction
• Applications of WSNs
• Challenges and Constraints
• One Step Ahead WSNs - WSANs
• SmartPark
• Research Activities
• Laboratory Facilities
• Conclusion

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Testbed
• Problem
– Hardware is (still) expensive; simulators are (still)
inaccurate; Large-scale testing and evaluation is difficult
• Solution Approach
– Wireless Ad-hoc Sensor/Actuator network
Laboratory (WASAL):
• > 10 Mica2 motes
• > 40 TinyNodes
• > 10 Sensor boards
• > 3 Base stations

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Testbed - Setup
• The feedback channel for control purposes –
all nodes connected to the server over
Ethernet cabling
• The real communication channel for research
purposes – neighboring nodes connected
together via wireless link
• Current status – deployment

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Conclusion
• WSNs consist of networking wireless sensors that are
lack of resources, what makes the design of WSN a
non-trivial problem.
• New research area – Distributed Control Systems
supported by WSANs.
• New applications like SmartPark that leverage new
networking techniques and both the public and the
research environments can benefit from it.
• New laboratory @ EPFL devoted to the development of
such new applications.

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

Clue-O-Meter: Did You Get The Point?

Please use the Mica2 motes to answer ;)

Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks

 Useful Links
• http://smartpark.epfl.ch
• http://tinyos.net
• http://sensorscope.epfl.ch
• http://www.ece.wisc.edu/~sensit/
• http://www.research.rutgers.edu/~mini/sensornetworks.html
• http://www.intel.com/research/exploratory/wireless_sensors.htm
• http://www.cs.wmich.edu/wsn/
• http://ceng.usc.edu/~anrg/SensorNetBib.html
• http://www.sensornetworks.net.au/
• http://www.zurich.ibm.com/sys/communication/sensors.html
• http://www.zigbee.org
• http://www.topology.org/comms/sn.html
• http://www.sics.se/sensornets/
• http://ideal.cecs.missouri.edu/
Michal Piorkowski EPFL I&C LCA4 Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks