Evaluating communication protocols for miniature wireless sensor devices

Abstract

Wireless sensor devices are commonly used for monitoring physical and environmental phenomena, and are often constrained in size due to mobility requirements. Their miniature size results in a drastic decrease in the battery capacity available, thus these devices typically run on a single radio transceiver.

While the drop in energy resources provides for a huge area of research in which novel communication protocols have to be designed to enable energy-efficient wireless communication, this project also explores the use of multiple transceivers for performance-centric applications.

Several approaches to implement similar multi-radio systems are evaluated for their viability on wireless sensor devices, by which the findings serve as a base for design and development of a multi-radio system comprising XBee radio modules.