StarDust: A Flexible Architecture for Passive Localization in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

The problem of localization in wireless sensor networks where nodes do not use ranging hardware, remains a challenging problem, when considering the required location accuracy, energy expenditure and the duration of the localization phase. In this paper we propose a framework, called StarDust, for wireless sensor network localization based on passive optical components. In the StarDust framework, sensor nodes are equipped with optical retro-reflectors. An aerial device projects light towards the deployed sensor network, and records an image of the reflected light. An image processing algorithm is developed for obtaining the locations of sensor nodes. For matching a node ID to a location we propose a constraint-based label relaxation algorithm. We propose and develop localization techniques based on four types of constraints: node color, neighbor information, deployment time for a node and deployment location for a node. We evaluate the performance of a localization system based on our framework by localizing a network of 26 sensor nodes deployed in a 120 × 60f t 2 area. The localization accuracy ranges from 2f t to 5f t while the localization time ranges from 10 milliseconds to 2 minutes.

Quantitative uncertainty-based incremental localization and anchor selection in wireless sensor networks

“…However, no matter which technique is used, these methods suffer from several drawbacks: first, they do not differentiate the uncertainty of measurements, or at least do not well quantify the uncertainty [29,28,10,27]. Therefore, their deduction is not theoretically optimal.…”

APL: Autonomous Passive Localization for Wireless Sensors Deployed in Road Networks

“…For road networks having these unique characteristics, legacy localization schemes have limitations. First of all, we can categorize legacy schemes into three kinds as follows: (a) Range-based schemes (e.g., TOA and TDOA [2,25]); (b) Range-free schemes (e.g., APIT); and (c) Artificial eventbased schemes (e.g., StarDust and Spotlight [21,22]). First, for the TOA scheme in [25], wireless sensors need GPS devices that are costly and require additional energy consumption.…”

“…In the same way as range-based schemes, when the spacing between the sensors is so large for communication, the beacon signal from the anchor nodes for localization cannot reach non-anchor nodes, so the range-free schemes cannot work well, either. Third, the localization schemes based on artificial event generation (e.g., StarDust and Spotlight [21,22]) are difficult to use in large-scale road networks, since it is hard to generate artificial events in a large area. Also, in the case where road networks are large, it is very hard to let artificial events reach all sensors.…”

“…The main idea of these schemes is to use artificial events for sensor localization that are generated from the event scheduler [8,18,22]. Some well-controlled artificial events, such as light, are injected into sensor networks.…”

Sensor Node Localization Using Uncontrolled Events

“…Most of them can be categorized into three classes: (i) range-based localization [16,2,19,5,29,21,11,32,3,8]; (ii) range-free localization [15,4,9,18,1,22]; and (iii) event-driven localization [20,24,25,17,33].…”