Enhancing the Performance of Wireless Sensor Networks with MIMO Communications

Abstract

Wireless sensor networks are an enabling technology for many future surveillance-oriented applications. Before a practical wireless sensor network is realized, however, significant challenges must be overcome. Chief among the obstacles to netted sensors is providing low power, robust communications between sensor nodes. Multiple lnput, Multiple Output (MIMO) communication promises performance enhancements over conventional single input, single output (SISO) technology for the same radiated power. If leveraged in a sensor network, MIMO may be able to provide significant network performance improvements in power consumption, latency, and network robustness. This paper investigates the benefit of MIMO implementations in multihop wireless sensor networks in terms of the mean path length. We find that MIMO provides improvement to wireless sensor networks, particularly those that have low to midrange node densities.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2004
Accession Number
AD1106836

Entities

People

  • James Dunyak
  • Jared Burdin

Organizations

  • MITRE Corporation

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Channel State Information
  • Communication Systems
  • Computer Programming
  • Data Transmission
  • Detectors
  • Energy Consumption
  • Energy Efficiency
  • Environment
  • Intrusion Detection
  • Multiple Input Multiple Output
  • Networks
  • Noise
  • Probability
  • Random Variables
  • Routing Protocols
  • Sensor Networks
  • Topology
  • Transmitters
  • Urban Areas
  • Wireless Communications
  • Wireless Networks
  • Wireless Sensor Networks

Fields of Study

  • Computer science

Readers

  • Computer Networking
  • Radio communications and signal processing.
  • Sensor Fusion and Tracking Systems.