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A special issue of Journal of Sensor and Actuator Networks (ISSN 2224-2708).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2014) | Viewed by 174697

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Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Stefan Fischer

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Guest Editor

Director of Institute of Telematics, University of Luebeck, 23562 Lübeck, Germany
Interests: computer networks; distributed systems; AI in networks; Internet of Things; nanonetworks
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We plan to publish a special issue on "feature papers" in order to give a broad overview of our area. We are looking for top quality papers which will be published free of charge in Open Access form. Authors will be the editorial board members and researchers invited by the editorial office and the Editor-in-Chief. Papers could be both long research papers and papers describing the current state of the art in one of the areas covered by the journal.

Prof. Dr. Stefan Fischer
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journal of Sensor and Actuator Networks is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Published Papers (14 papers)

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Research

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679 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Connected Car: Quantified Self becomes Quantified Car

by Melanie Swan

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2015, 4(1), 2-29; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan4010002 - 04 Feb 2015

Cited by 71 | Viewed by 30402

Abstract

The automotive industry could be facing a situation of profound change and opportunity in the coming decades. There are a number of influencing factors such as increasing urban and aging populations, self-driving cars, 3D parts printing, energy innovation, and new models of transportation service delivery (Zipcar, Uber). The connected car means that vehicles are now part of the connected world, continuously Internet-connected, generating and transmitting data, which on the one hand can be helpfully integrated into applications, like real-time traffic alerts broadcast to smartwatches, but also raises security and privacy concerns. This paper explores the automotive connected world, and describes five killer QS (Quantified Self)-auto sensor applications that link quantified-self sensors (sensors that measure the personal biometrics of individuals like heart rate) and automotive sensors (sensors that measure driver and passenger biometrics or quantitative automotive performance metrics like speed and braking activity). The applications are fatigue detection, real-time assistance for parking and accidents, anger management and stress reduction, keyless authentication and digital identity verification, and DIY diagnostics. These kinds of applications help to demonstrate the benefit of connected world data streams in the automotive industry and beyond where, more fundamentally for human progress, the automation of both physical and now cognitive tasks is underway. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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360 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Methods for Distributed Compressed Sensing

by Dennis Sundman, Saikat Chatterjee and Mikael Skoglund

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2014, 3(1), 1-25; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan3010001 - 23 Dec 2013

Cited by 15 | Viewed by 6822

Abstract

Compressed sensing is a thriving research field covering a class of problems where a large sparse signal is reconstructed from a few random measurements. In the presence of several sensor nodes measuring correlated sparse signals, improvements in terms of recovery quality or the requirement for a fewer number of local measurements can be expected if the nodes cooperate. In this paper, we provide an overview of the current literature regarding distributed compressed sensing; in particular, we discuss aspects of network topologies, signal models and recovery algorithms. Full article

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394 KiB

Open AccessArticle

An Ontology-Based Context Model for Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) Management in the Internet of Things

by Yang Liu, Boon-Chong Seet and Adnan Al-Anbuky

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(4), 653-674; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2040653 - 30 Sep 2013

Cited by 18 | Viewed by 9473

Abstract

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) are an enabling technology of context-aware systems. The Internet of Things (IoT), which has attracted much attention in recent years, is an emerging paradigm where everyday objects and spaces are made context-aware and interconnected through heterogeneous networks on a global scale. However, the IoT system can suffer from poor performances when its underlying networks are not optimized. In this paper, an ontology model for representing and facilitating context sharing between network entities in WSNs is proposed for the first time. The context model aims to enable optimal context-aware management of WSNs in IoT, which will also harness the rich context knowledge of IoT systems. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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2489 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Marmote SDR: Experimental Platform for Low-Power Wireless Protocol Stack Research

by Sándor Szilvási, Benjámin Babják, Péter Völgyesi and Ákos Lédeczi

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(3), 631-652; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2030631 - 09 Sep 2013

Cited by 12 | Viewed by 8023

Abstract

Over the past decade, wireless sensor network research primarily relied on highly-integrated commercial off-the-shelf radio chips. The rigid silicon implementation of the radio stack restricted access to the lower layers; thus, research focused mainly on the medium access control (MAC) layer and above. SRAM field-programmable gate array (FPGA)-based software-defined radios (SDR), on the other hand, provide a flexible architecture to experiment with any and all layers of the radio stack, but usually require desktop computers and draw high currents that prohibit mobile or longer-term outdoor deployments. To address these issues, we have developed a modular flash FPGA-based wireless research platform, called Marmote SDR, that has computational resources comparable to those of SRAM FPGA-based radio platforms, but at a reduced power consumption, with duty cycling support. We discuss the design decisions underlying Marmote SDR and evaluate its power consumption. Furthermore, we present and evaluate an asynchronous and multiple access communication protocol specifically designed for data-gathering wireless sensor networks. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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286 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Physical Layer Design in Wireless Sensor Networks for Fading Mitigation

by Stevan Berber and Nuo Chen

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(3), 614-630; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2030614 - 02 Sep 2013

Cited by 10 | Viewed by 8809

Abstract

This paper presents the theoretical analysis, simulation results and suggests design in digital technology of a physical layer for wireless sensor networks. The proposed design is able to mitigate fading inside communication channel. To mitigate fading the chip interleaving technique is proposed. For the proposed theoretical model of physical layer, a rigorous mathematical analysis is conducted, where all signals are presented and processed in discrete time domain form which is suitable for further direct processing necessary for devices design in digital technology. Three different channels are used to investigate characteristics of the physical layer: additive white Gaussian noise channel (AWGN), AWG noise and flat fading channel and AWG noise and flat fading channel with interleaver and deinterleaver blocks in the receiver and transmitter respectively. Firstly, the mathematical model of communication system representing physical layer is developed based on the discrete time domain signal representation and processing. In the existing theory, these signals and their processing are represented in continuous time form, which is not suitable for direct implementation in digital technology. Secondly, the expressions for the probability of chip, symbol and bit error are derived. Thirdly, the communication system simulators are developed in MATLAB. The simulation results confirmed theoretical findings. Full article

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2002 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Multi-Agent-Based Intelligent Sensor and Actuator Network Design for Smart House and Home Automation

by Qingquan Sun, Weihong Yu, Nikolai Kochurov, Qi Hao and Fei Hu

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(3), 557-588; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2030557 - 19 Aug 2013

Cited by 70 | Viewed by 13534

Abstract

The smart-house technology aims to increase home automation and security with reduced energy consumption. A smart house consists of various intelligent sensors and actuators operating on different platforms with conflicting objectives. This paper proposes a multi-agent system (MAS) design framework to achieve smart house automation. The novelties of this work include the developments of (1) belief, desire and intention (BDI) agent behavior models; (2) a regulation policy-based multi-agent collaboration mechanism; and (3) a set of metrics for MAS performance evaluation. Simulations of case studies are performed using the Java Agent Development Environment (JADE) to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed method. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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799 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Prototyping an Operational System with Multiple Sensors for Pasture Monitoring

by David L. Gobbett, Rebecca N. Handcock, Andre Zerger, Chris Crossman, Philip Valencia, Tim Wark and Micah Davies

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(3), 388-408; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2030388 - 01 Jul 2013

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 8642

Abstract

Combining multiple proximal sensors within a wireless sensor network (WSN) enhances our capacity to monitor vegetation, compared to using a single sensor or non-networked setup. Data from sensors with different spatial and temporal characteristics can provide complementary information. For example, point-based sensors such as multispectral sensors which monitor at high temporal frequency but, at a single point, can be complemented by array-based sensors such as digital cameras which have greater spatial resolution but may only gather data at infrequent intervals. In this article we describe the successful deployment of a prototype system for using multiple proximal sensors (multispectral sensors and digital cameras) for monitoring pastures. We show that there are many technical issues involved in such a deployment, and we share insights relevant for other researchers who may consider using WSNs for an operational deployment for pasture monitoring under often difficult environmental conditions. Although the sensors and infrastructure are important, we found that other issues arise and that an end-to-end workflow is an essential part of effectively capturing, processing and managing the data from a WSN. Our deployment highlights the importance of testing and ongoing monitoring of the entire workflow to ensure the quality of data captured. We demonstrate that the combination of different sensors enhances our ability to identify sensor problems necessary to collect accurate data for pasture monitoring. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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796 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Semantic Models for Scalable Search in the Internet of Things

by Richard Mietz, Sven Groppe, Kay Römer and Dennis Pfisterer

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(2), 172-195; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2020172 - 27 Mar 2013

Cited by 18 | Viewed by 10809

Abstract

The Internet of Things is anticipated to connect billions of embedded devices equipped with sensors to perceive their surroundings. Thereby, the state of the real world will be available online and in real-time and can be combined with other data and services in the Internet to realize novel applications such as Smart Cities, Smart Grids, or Smart Healthcare. This requires an open representation of sensor data and scalable search over data from diverse sources including sensors. In this paper we show how the Semantic Web technologies RDF (an open semantic data format) and SPARQL (a query language for RDF-encoded data) can be used to address those challenges. In particular, we describe how prediction models can be employed for scalable sensor search, how these prediction models can be encoded as RDF, and how the models can be queried by means of SPARQL. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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1078 KiB

Open AccessArticle

User and Machine Authentication and Authorization Infrastructure for Distributed Wireless Sensor Network Testbeds

by Markus Anwander, Torsten Braun, Philipp Hurni, Thomas Staub and Gerald Wagenknecht

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(1), 109-121; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2010109 - 06 Mar 2013

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 6755

Abstract

The intention of an authentication and authorization infrastructure (AAI) is to simplify and unify access to different web resources. With a single login, a user can access web applications at multiple organizations. The Shibboleth authentication and authorization infrastructure is a standards-based, open source software package for web single sign-on (SSO) across or within organizational boundaries. It allows service providers to make fine-grained authorization decisions for individual access of protected online resources. The Shibboleth system is a widely used AAI, but only supports protection of browser-based web resources. We have implemented a Shibboleth AAI extension to protect web services using Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP). Besides user authentication for browser-based web resources, this extension also provides user and machine authentication for web service-based resources. Although implemented for a Shibboleth AAI, the architecture can be easily adapted to other AAIs. Full article

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3051 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Group-based Motion Detection for Energy-Efficient Localisation

by Raja Jurdak, Branislav Kusy and Alban Cotillon

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2012, 1(3), 183-216; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan1030183 - 19 Oct 2012

Cited by 6 | Viewed by 7081

Abstract

Long-term outdoor localization remains challenging due to the high energy profiles of GPS modules. Duty cycling the GPS module combined with inertial sensors can improve energy consumption. However, inertial sensors that are kept active all the time can also drain mobile node batteries. This paper proposes duty cycling strategies for inertial sensors to maintain a target position accuracy and node lifetime. We present a method for duty cycling motion sensors according to features of movement events, and evaluate its energy and accuracy profile for an empirical data trace of cattle movement. We further introduce the concept of group-based duty cycling, where nodes that cluster together can share the burden of motion detection to reduce their duty cycles. Our evaluation shows that both variants of motion sensor duty cycling yield up to 78% improvement in overall node power consumption, and that the group-based method yields an additional 20% power reduction during periods of low mobility. Full article

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7384 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Localization in Wireless Sensor Networks and Anchor Placement

by Thomas Kunz and Benjamin Tatham

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2012, 1(1), 36-58; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan1010036 - 08 Jun 2012

Cited by 33 | Viewed by 5973

Abstract

Applications of wireless sensor network (WSN) often expect knowledge of the precise location of the nodes. Many different localization protocols have been proposed that allow nodes to derive their location rather than equipping them with dedicated localization hardware such as GPS receivers, which increases node costs. We provide a brief survey of the major approaches to software-based node localization in WSN. One class of localization protocols with good localization performance patches together relative-coordinate, local maps into a global-coordinate map. These protocols require some nodes that know their absolute coordinates, called anchor nodes. While many factors influence the node position errors, in this class of protocols, using Procrustes Analysis, the placement of the anchor nodes can significantly impact the error. Through simulation, using the Curvilinear Component Analysis (CCA-MAP) protocol as a representative protocol in this category, we show the impact of anchor node placement and propose a set of guidelines to ensure the best possible outcome, while using the smallest number of anchor nodes possible. Full article

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Review

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597 KiB

Open AccessReview

Software Updating in Wireless Sensor Networks: A Survey and Lacunae

by Stephen Brown and Cormac J. Sreenan

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(4), 717-760; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2040717 - 14 Nov 2013

Cited by 32 | Viewed by 10320

Abstract

Wireless Sensor Networks are moving out of the laboratory and into the field. For a number of reasons there is often a need to update sensor node software, or node configuration, after deployment. The need for over-the-air updates is driven both by the scale of deployments, and by the remoteness and inaccessibility of sensor nodes. This need has been recognized since the early days of sensor networks, and research results from the related areas of mobile networking and distributed systems have been applied to this area. In order to avoid any manual intervention, the update process needs to be autonomous. This paper presents a comprehensive survey of software updating in Wireless Sensor Networks, and analyses the features required to make these updates autonomous. A new taxonomy of software update features and a new model for fault detection and recovery are presented. The paper concludes by identifying the lacunae relating to autonomous software updates, providing direction for future research. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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857 KiB

Open AccessReview

IETF Standardization in the Field of the Internet of Things (IoT): A Survey

by Isam Ishaq, David Carels, Girum K. Teklemariam, Jeroen Hoebeke, Floris Van den Abeele, Eli De Poorter, Ingrid Moerman and Piet Demeester

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(2), 235-287; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2020235 - 25 Apr 2013

Cited by 175 | Viewed by 40754

Abstract

Smart embedded objects will become an important part of what is called the Internet of Things. However, the integration of embedded devices into the Internet introduces several challenges, since many of the existing Internet technologies and protocols were not designed for this class of devices. In the past few years, there have been many efforts to enable the extension of Internet technologies to constrained devices. Initially, this resulted in proprietary protocols and architectures. Later, the integration of constrained devices into the Internet was embraced by IETF, moving towards standardized IP-based protocols. In this paper, we will briefly review the history of integrating constrained devices into the Internet, followed by an extensive overview of IETF standardization work in the 6LoWPAN, ROLL and CoRE working groups. This is complemented with a broad overview of related research results that illustrate how this work can be extended or used to tackle other problems and with a discussion on open issues and challenges. As such the aim of this paper is twofold: apart from giving readers solid insights in IETF standardization work on the Internet of Things, it also aims to encourage readers to further explore the world of Internet-connected objects, pointing to future research opportunities. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Feature Papers)

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248 KiB

Open AccessReview

A Survey of Sensor Web Services for the Smart Grid

by Omar Asad, Melike Erol-Kantarci and Hussein T. Mouftah

J. Sens. Actuator Netw. 2013, 2(1), 98-108; https://doi.org/10.3390/jsan2010098 - 06 Mar 2013

Cited by 13 | Viewed by 6501

Abstract

The broad use ofWireless Sensor Networks (WSN) in various fields have resulted in growing demand for advanced data collection and querying mechanisms embedded in the sensor node. Sensor Web Services (SWS) have recently emerged as a promising tool to enable external machines to have access to the information collected by public sensor webs. Machine-to-machine interactions or wireless sensor and actor networks can take advantage of this platform-independent technology to develop diverse smart grid applications. In this survey, we first briefly present the state of the art in SWS technology by describing the techniques for customizing web services to fit the sensor node capabilities such as customizing the WSDL file, compressing XML documents and redesigning TCP protocol. Then, we survey the studies that have utilized the SWS technology in smart grid applications. These studies have shown that SWS provide energy management capabilities to the consumers and the utilities, and they are well suited for smart grid integrated smart home solutions. Full article

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