Distributed Global Identification for Sensor Networks

Abstract

A sensor network consists of a set of battery-powered nodes, which collaborate to perform sensing tasks in a given environment. It may contain one or more base stations to collect sensed data and possibly relay it to a central processing and storage system. These networks are characterized by scarcity of resources, in particular the available energy. We present a distributed algorithm to solve the unique ID assignment problem. The proposed solution starts by assigning long unique IDs and organizing nodes in a tree structure. This tree structure is used to compute the size of the network. Then unique IDs are assigned using the minimum number of bytes. Globally unique IDs are useful in providing many network functions, e.g. configuration, monitoring of individual nodes, and various security mechanisms. Theoretical and simulation analysis of the proposed solution have been preformed. The results demonstrate that a high percentage of nodes "more than 99%" are assigned globally unique IDs at the termination of the algorithm when the algorithm parameters are set properly. Furthermore, the algorithm terminates in a relatively short time that scales well with the network size. For example, the algorithm terminates in about 5 minutes for a network of 1,000 nodes.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2005
Accession Number
ADA470551

Entities

People

  • Bonnie S. Heck
  • Douglas M. Blough
  • Elmoustapha Ould-ahmed-vall
  • George F. Riley

Organizations

  • Georgia Tech

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Algorithms
  • Collision Avoidance
  • Collisions
  • Detectors
  • Energy Consumption
  • Engineering
  • Explosives Initiators
  • Identification
  • Low Density
  • Monitoring
  • Networks
  • Probability
  • Routing Protocols
  • Security
  • Sensor Networks
  • Simulations
  • Simulators

Fields of Study

  • Computer science

Readers

  • Operations Research
  • Sensor Fusion and Tracking Systems.