Skip to main content
Log in

Design Considerations for Energy-Efficient Radios in Wireless Microsensor Networks

  • Published:
Journal of VLSI signal processing systems for signal, image and video technology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In the past few years, wireless microsensor networks have attracted a great deal of attention in the research community. This is due to the applications that will be enabled once wireless microsensor networks are in place. The design of wireless microsensor networks, however, represents a difficult challenge. Since many applications require fault-tolerant, long-term sensing, one important challenge is to design sensor networks that have long system lifetimes. Achieving long system lifetimes is difficult because sensor nodes are severely energy-constrained. In this paper, we demonstrate system-level techniques that adapt and tradeoff software and hardware parameters in response to changes in the requirements of the user, the characteristics of the underlying hardware, and the properties of the environment. By using these power-aware, system-level techniques, we are able to reduce the energy consumption of both general, adaptable systems and dedicated point systems. Moreover, given a specific set of operating conditions for a particular system, we show how energy savings of 50% can be achieved.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. D. Estrin, R. Govindan, J. Heidemann, and S. Kumar, “Next Century Challenges: Scalable Coordination in Sensor Networs,” in Proceedings of the Fifth Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom '99), Aug. 1999, pp. 263-270.

  2. K. Bult et al., “Low Power Systems for Wireless Microsensors,” in Proceedings of the International Symposium on Low Power Electronics and Design (ISLPED '96), Aug. 1996, pp. 17-21.

  3. J. Kahn, R. Katz, and K. Pister, “Next Century Challenges: Mobile Networking for Smart Dust,” in Proceedings of the Fifth Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom '99), Aug. 1999, pp. 271-278.

  4. N. Priyantha, A. Chakraborty, and H. Balakrishnan, “The Cricket Location-Support System,” in Proceedings of the Sixth Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom '00), Aug. 2000, pp. 32-43.

  5. J. Rabaey et al., “PicoRadio Supports Ad Hoc-Ultra-Low Power Wireless Networking,” in Computer, July 2000, pp. 42-48.

  6. L. Nord and J. Haartsen, The Bluetooth Radio Specification and The Bluetooth Baseband Specification. Bluetooth, 1999–2000.

  7. A.P. Chandrakasan, S. Sheng, and R. W. Brodersen, “Low-Power CMOS Digital Design,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, vol. 24, no. 4, 1992, pp. 473-484.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. J. Kao, “Subthreshold Leakage Control Techniques for Low Power Digital Circuits,” Ph.D. Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2001.

  9. M. Bhardwaj, R. Min, and A. Chandrakasan, “Power-Aware Systems,” in Proceedings of the 34th Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems, and Computers, Nov. 2000.

  10. M. Bhardwaj, R. Min, and A. Chandrakasan, “Quantifying and Enhancing Power-Awareness in VLSI Systems,” IEEE Transactions on Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) Systems, vol. 9, no. 6, 2001, pp. 757-772.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. LMX3162 Evaluation Notes and Datasheet, April 1999.

  12. S. Cho and A. Chandrakasan, “A 6.5 GHz CMOS FSK Modulator for Wireless Sensor Applications,” in IEEE Symposium on VLSI Circuits Digest of Technical Papers, 2002, pp. 182-185

  13. A. Klaiber, The Technology Behind Crusoe Processors. Transmeta Corporation. http://www.transmeta.com, Jan. 2000.

  14. Intel XScale Microarchitecture. http://developer.intel.com/design/intelxscale/, 2000–2001.

  15. M. Perrott, T. Tewksbury, and C. Sodini, “27 mW CMOS Fractional-N Synthesizer/Modulator IC,” in ISSCC Digest of Technical Papers, Feb. 1997, pp. 366-367.

  16. N. Filiol, T. Riley, C. Plett, and M. Copeland, “An Agile ISM Band Frequency Synthesizer with built-in GMSK Data Modulation,” in IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, vol. 33, July 1998, pp. 998-1008.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. J. Proakis, Digital Communications, 4th edn. McGraw-Hill, New York City, New York, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  18. D. Akerberg, “Properties of a TDMA Pico Cellular Office Communication System,” in IEEE Proceedings of GLOBECOM, 1998, pp. 1343-1349.

  19. G. Janssen and R. Prasad, “Propagation Measurements in an Indoor Radio Environment at 2.4 GHz, 4.75 GHz and 11.5 GHz,” in Proceedings of the VTS Conference on Frontiers of Technology, 1992, pp. 617-620.

  20. G. Asada et al., “Wireless Integrated Network Sensors: Low Power Systems on a Chip,” in Proc. ESSCIRC '98, 1998.

  21. D. McMahill, “Automatic Calibration of Modulated Fractional-N Frequency Synthesizers,” Ph.D. Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2001.

  22. C. Intanagonwiwat, R. Govindan, and D. Estrin, “Directed Diffusion: A Scalable and Robust Communication Paradigm for Sensor Networks,” in Proceedings of the Sixth Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom '00), Aug. 2000, pp. 56-67.

  23. W. Heinzelman, A. Chandrakasan, and H. Balakrishnan, “Energy-Efficient Communication Protocol for Wireless Microsensor Networks,” in Proc. HICSS 2000, Jan. 2000.

  24. J.-H. Chang and L. Tassiulas, “Energy Conserving Routing in Wireless Ad-hoc Networks,” in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM (INFOCOM '00), March 2000, pp. 22-31.

  25. S. Singh, M. Woo, and C. Raghavendra, “Power-Aware Routing in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks,” in Proceedings of the Fourth Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking (MobiCom '98), Oct. 1998, pp. 181-190.

  26. V. Rodoplu and T.H. Meng, “Minimum Energy Mobile Wireless Networks,” IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, vol. 17, no. 8, 1999, pp. 1333-1344.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. J.-H. Ju and V. Li, “TDMA Scheduling Design of Multihop Packet Radio Networks Based on Latin Squares,” in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM (INFOCOM '99), 1999, pp. 187-193.

  28. S. Kishore, J.-C. Chen, K. Sivalingam, and P. Agrawal, “A Battery Power Level Aware MAC Protocol for CDMA Wireless Networks,” in IEEE International Conference on Universal Personal Communications, 1998, pp. 967-971.

  29. P. Lettieri and M.B. Srivastava, “Adaptive Frame Length Control for Improving Wireless Link Throughput, Range, and Energy Efficiency,” in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM (INFOCOM '98), March 1998, pp. 564-571.

  30. M. Zorzi and R. Rao, “Error Control and Energy Consumption in Communications for Nomadic Computing,” IEEE Transactions on Computers, March 1997.

  31. B. Narendran et al., “Evaluation of an Adaptive Power and Error Control Algorithm for Wireless Systems,” in IEEE ICC '97, 1997.

  32. J.-P. Ebert and A. Wolisz, “Combined Tuning of RF Power and Medium Access Control for WLANs,” in Proceedings of the Sixth International Workshop on Mobile Multimedia and Communications (MoMUC '99), 1999.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Shih, E., Cho, S., Lee, F.S. et al. Design Considerations for Energy-Efficient Radios in Wireless Microsensor Networks. The Journal of VLSI Signal Processing-Systems for Signal, Image, and Video Technology 37, 77–94 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:VLSI.0000017004.57230.91

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:VLSI.0000017004.57230.91

Navigation