In this paper, we present a family of adaptive protocols, called SPIN (Sensor Protocols for Information via Negotiation), that efficiently disseminates information among sensors in an energy-constrained wireless sensor network. Nodes running a SPIN communication protocol name their data using high-level data descriptors, called meta-data. They use meta-data negotiations to eliminate the transmission of redundant data throughout the network. In addition, SPIN nodes can base their communication decisions both upon application-specific knowledge of the data and upon knowledge of the resources that are available to them. This allows the sensors to efficiently distribute data given a limited energy supply. We simulate and analyze the performance of two specific SPIN protocols, comparing them to other possible approaches and a theoretically optimal protocol. We find that the SPIN protocols can deliver 60% more data for a given amount of energy than conventional approaches. We also find that, in terms of dissemination rate and energy usage, the SPlN protocols perform close to the theoretical optimum.

/pdf/adaptive-protocols-for-information-dissemination-in-wireless-2lo594hki6.pdf

Adaptive protocols for information dissemination in wireless sensor networks

In the Hamadryas baboon, males are substantially larger than females. A troop of baboons is subdivided into a number of ‘one-male groups’, consisting of one adult male and one or more females with their young. The male prevents any of ‘his’ females from moving too far from him. Kummer (1971) performed the following experiment. Two males, A and B, previously unknown to each other, were placed in a large enclosure. Male A was free to move about the enclosure, but male B was shut in a small cage, from which he could observe A but not interfere. A female, unknown to both males, was then placed in the enclosure. Within 20 minutes male A had persuaded the female to accept his ownership. Male B was then released into the open enclosure. Instead of challenging male A , B avoided any contact, accepting A’s ownership.

Evolution and the Theory of Games

Topology Control (TC) is one of the most important techniques used in wireless ad hoc and sensor networks to reduce energy consumption (which is essential to extend the network operational time) and radio interference (with a positive effect on the network traffic carrying capacity). The goal of this technique is to control the topology of the graph representing the communication links between network nodes with the purpose of maintaining some global graph property (e.g., connectivity), while reducing energy consumption and/or interference that are strictly related to the nodes' transmitting range. In this article, we state several problems related to topology control in wireless ad hoc and sensor networks, and we survey state-of-the-art solutions which have been proposed to tackle them. We also outline several directions for further research which we hope will motivate researchers to undertake additional studies in this field.

/pdf/topology-control-in-wireless-ad-hoc-and-sensor-networks-3e17u396zt.pdf

Topology Control in Wireless Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks

In this paper, we present a family of adaptive protocols, called SPIN (Sensor Protocols for Information via Negotiation), that efficiently disseminate information among sensors in an energy-constrained wireless sensor network. Nodes running a SPIN communication protocol name their data using high-level data descriptors, called meta-data. They use meta-data negotiations to eliminate the transmission of redundant data throughout the network. In addition, SPIN nodes can base their communication decisions both upon application-specific knowledge of the data and upon knowledge of the resources that are available to them. This allows the sensors to efficiently distribute data given a limited energy supply. We simulate and analyze the performance of four specific SPIN protocols: SPIN-PP and SPIN-EC, which are optimized for a point-to-point network, and SPIN-BC and SPIN-RL, which are optimized for a broadcast network. Comparing the SPIN protocols to other possible approaches, we find that the SPIN protocols can deliver 60% more data for a given amount of energy than conventional approaches in a point-to-point network and 80% more data for a given amount of energy in a broadcast network. We also find that, in terms of dissemination rate and energy usage, the SPIN protocols perform close to the theoretical optimum in both point-to-point and broadcast networks.

/pdf/negotiation-based-protocols-for-disseminating-information-in-1i6jhgr0p8.pdf

Negotiation-based protocols for disseminating information in wireless sensor networks

This self-contained introduction to the distributed control of robotic networks offers a distinctive blend of computer science and control theory. The book presents a broad set of tools for understanding coordination algorithms, determining their correctness, and assessing their complexity; and it analyzes various cooperative strategies for tasks such as consensus, rendezvous, connectivity maintenance, deployment, and boundary estimation. The unifying theme is a formal model for robotic networks that explicitly incorporates their communication, sensing, control, and processing capabilities--a model that in turn leads to a common formal language to describe and analyze coordination algorithms.Written for first- and second-year graduate students in control and robotics, the book will also be useful to researchers in control theory, robotics, distributed algorithms, and automata theory. The book provides explanations of the basic concepts and main results, as well as numerous examples and exercises.Self-contained exposition of graph-theoretic concepts, distributed algorithms, and complexity measures for processor networks with fixed interconnection topology and for robotic networks with position-dependent interconnection topology Detailed treatment of averaging and consensus algorithms interpreted as linear iterations on synchronous networks Introduction of geometric notions such as partitions, proximity graphs, and multicenter functions Detailed treatment of motion coordination algorithms for deployment, rendezvous, connectivity maintenance, and boundary estimation

/pdf/distributed-control-of-robotic-networks-a-mathematical-1q6nfcvi2l.pdf

Distributed Control of Robotic Networks: A Mathematical Approach to Motion Coordination Algorithms

A method of deterministic simulation of fully operational parallel machines on the analogous machines prone to errors is developed. The simulation is presented for the exclusive-read exclusive-write (EREW) PRAM and the Optical Communication Parallel Computer (OCPC), but it applies to a large class of parallel computers. It is shown that simulations of operational multiprocessor machines on faulty ones can be performed with logarithmic slowdown in the worst case. More precisely, we prove that both a PRAM with a bounded fraction of faulty processors and memory cells and an OCPC with a bounded fraction of faulty processors can simulate deterministically their fault-free counterparts with $\mathcal{O}$(log n) slowdown and preprocessing done in time $\mathcal{O}$(log2n). The fault model is as follows. The faults are deterministic (worst-case distribution) and static (do not change in the course of a computation). If a processor attempts to communicate with some other processor (in the case of an OCPC) or read a memory word (in the case of a PRAM) then it is immediately notified whether the operation was successful (fault-free addressee) or failed (faulty addressee).

Fast Deterministic Simulation of Computations on Faulty Parallel Machines

Two or more mobile entities, called agents or robots, starting at distinct initial positions in some environment, have to meet. This task is known in the literature as rendezvous. Among many alternative assumptions that have been used to study the rendezvous problem, two most significantly influence the methodology appropriate for its solution. The first of these assumptions concerns the environment in which the mobile entities navigate: it can be either a terrain in the plane, or a network modeled as an undirected graph. In the case of networks, methods and results further depend on whether the agents have the ability to mark nodes in some way. The second assumption concerns the way in which the entities move: it can be either deterministic or randomized. In this paper we survey models and results concerning deterministic rendezvous in networks, where agents cannot mark nodes.

DISC 2011 invited lecture: deterministic rendezvous in networks: survey of models and results

In comparison models for system-level fault diagnosis, pairs of units are given the same job and results are compared. The result of such a comparison test can be 0 (match) or 1 (mismatch) and diagnosis is based on the collection of test results. Two such models have been studied, among others: the symmetric model of K.Y. Chwa and S.L. Hakimi (Inform. Control, 49, p.212-38, 1981) and the asymmetric model of M. Malek (Proc. 7th Symp. Comput. Architecture, p.31-35, May 1980). The worst-case optimal testing algorithms for t-fault detection, sequential t-fault diagnosis, and one-step t-fault diagnosis in both models are presented. Nonadaptive and adaptive testing is discussed and it is shown that the latter often enables one to decrease the number of tests. >

Optimal fault diagnosis in comparison models

Two mobile agents, starting from different nodes of an unknown network, have to meet at a node. Agents move in synchronous rounds using a deterministic algorithm. Each agent has a different label, which it can use in the execution of the algorithm, but it does not know the label of the other agent. Agents do not know any bound on the size of the network. In each round an agent decides if it remains idle or if it wants to move to one of the adjacent nodes. Agents are subject to delay faults: if an agent incurs a fault in a given round, it remains in the current node, regardless of its decision. If it planned to move and the fault happened, the agent is aware of it. We consider three scenarios of fault distribution: random (independently in each round and for each agent with constant probability $$0

Rendezvous in networks in spite of delay faults

Broadcast is one of the fundamental network communication primitives. One node of a network, called the source, has a message that has to be learned by all other nodes. We consider broadcast in radio networks, modeled as simple undirected connected graphs with a distinguished source. Nodes communicate in synchronous rounds. In each round, a node can either transmit a message to all its neighbours, or stay silent and listen. At the receiving end, a node v hears a message from a neighbour w in a given round if v listens in this round and if w is its only neighbour that transmits in this round. If more than one neighbour of a node v transmits in a given round, we say that a collision occurs at v. We do not assume collision detection: in case of a collision, node v does not hear anything (except the background noise that it also hears when no neighbour transmits). We are interested in the feasibility of deterministic broadcast in radio networks. If nodes of the network do not have any labels, deterministic broadcast is impossible even in the four-cycle. On the other hand, if all nodes have distinct labels, then broadcast can be carried out, e.g., in a round-robin fashion, and hence O(log n)-bit labels are sufficient for this task in n-node networks. In fact, O(log Δ)-bit labels, where Δ is the maximum degree, are enough to broadcast successfully. Hence, it is natural to ask if very short labels are sufficient for broadcast. Our main result is a positive answer to this question. We show that every radio network can be labeled using 2 bits in such a way that broadcast can be accomplished by some universal deterministic algorithm that does not know the network topology nor any bound on its size. Moreover, at the expense of an extra bit in the labels, we can get the following additional strong property of our algorithm: there exists a common round in which all nodes know that broadcast has been completed.

Andrzej Pelc

Papers

Fast Deterministic Simulation of Computations on Faulty Parallel Machines

DISC 2011 invited lecture: deterministic rendezvous in networks: survey of models and results

Optimal fault diagnosis in comparison models

Rendezvous in networks in spite of delay faults

Constant-Length Labeling Schemes for Deterministic Radio Broadcast