Architecture Design and Implementation of an Ad-Hoc Network for Disaster Relief Operations

This paper presents an ad-hoc sensor network especially developed for a disaster relief application that provides the rescue teams with a quickly deployable, cost-effective, and reliable tool to collect information about the presence of people in a collapsed building space and the state of the ruins. The hardware/software architecture of the wireless sensor nodes is developed for a low-cost design implementation. Energy efficiency is another objective of this paper, achieved by the combination of a low-power-mode algorithm and a power-aware routing strategy. A selected set of simulation studies indicate a reduction in energy consumption and a significant increase in node lifetime whereas network performance is not affected significantly. Finally, a lightweight management architecture is presented to facilitate autonomous management of ad-hoc sensor networks

I. Introduction

Recently, there has been increased research interest in the area of ad-hoc networks. Such networks can operate without the presence of any preinstalled network infrastructure, while being able to handle node mobility and dynamic network topologies. Owing to these properties, ad-hoc networks have been employed in many critical applications, such as military, law enforcement, or disaster-relief operations.