Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless Sensor Networks, also known as Sensory Networks or Sensitive Networks and abbreviated in English to (WSN), consist of a series of small electronic devices that access the outdoor world by means of sensors. The name given to this type of device is “mote”, from the phrase “mote of dust”, with the idea of conveying two main concepts in just one word: their small size and the idea that they can be placed anywhere. This concept gave rise to the formation of Dust Networks and to the nickname Smart Dust. Other ways of denoting a mote include Sensory Node or Sensor Node .

OPERATION AND CHARACTERISTICS

Motes are able to communicate with each other by creating mesh networks using the ZigBee protocol and to retransmit information acquired through the network to a control point that records noted values and that even makes decisions in consequence. It is the motes that automatically organise themselves every so often to see which communication routes are available. This allows the motes to change place in order to monitor a different area at a particular time.

The main features of this type of network are:

Scalability

The network’s capacity to self-organise allows larger spaces to be monitored more easily by adding new motes. In doing this, they are automatically recognised by the rest, which update their route tables accordingly. This feature is very important since it means that they can be installed in a wide range of scenarios.

High availability

This feature of self-organisation makes it also possible to reduce the monitored area. If a mote stops operating, the remaining values can continue to be transmitted through alternative paths thanks to the dynamic routing algorithm responsible for updating routes. This means that the operation of the rest of the network is always guaranteed, unlike with a centralised communication model.

Easy implementation

The fact that the communication is wireless, and thus eliminates the need to move network cables, and for the power supply to be through batteries, makes installation easy and possible in any environment, opening up a wide range of applications that can benefit from this technology.

See more applications of WSN in this section: