Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Location, Localization, and Localizability

  • Survey
  • Published:
Journal of Computer Science and Technology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Location-aware technology spawns numerous unforeseen pervasive applications in a wide range of living, production, commence, and public services. This article provides an overview of the location, localization, and localizability issues of wireless ad-hoc and sensor networks. Making data geographically meaningful, location information is essential for many applications, and it deeply aids a number of network functions, such as network routing, topology control, coverage, boundary detection, clustering, etc. We investigate a large body of existing localization approaches with focuses on error control and network localizability, the two rising aspects that attract significant research interests in recent years. Error control aims to alleviate the negative impact of noisy ranging measurement and the error accumulation effect during cooperative localization process. Network localizability provides theoretical analysis on the performance of localization approaches, providing guidance on network configuration and adjustment. We emphasize the basic principles of localization to understand the state-of-the-art and to address directions of future research in the new and largely open areas of location-aware technologies.

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

Access this article

Log in via an institution

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

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Varshneyy U. Pervasive healthcare. IEEE Computer, 2003, 36(12): 138–140.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Borriello G, Stanford V, Narayanaswami C, Menning W. Pervasive computing in healthcare. IEEE Pervasive Computing, 2007, 6(1): 17–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Satyanarayanan M. Pervasive computing: Vision and challenges. IEEE Personal Communications, 2001, 8(4): 10–17.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Weiser M. The computer for the twenty-first century. Scientific American, 1991, 265(3): 94–104.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Angeles R. RFID technologies: Supply-chain applications and implementation issues. Information Systems Management, 2005, 22(1): 51–65.

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  6. Gliddeny R. Design of ultra-low-cost UHF RFID tags for supply chain applications. IEEE Communications Magazine, 2004, 42(8): 140–151.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Yang Z, Li M, Liu Y. Sea depth measurement with restricted floating sensors. In Proc. IEEE RTSS, Tucson, USA, Dec. 3–6, 2007, pp.469–478.

  8. Li M, Liu Y. Underground coal mine monitoring with wireless sensor networks. ACM Transactions on Sensor Networks (TOSN), 2009, 5(2): 10.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Mo L, He Y, Liu Y et al. Canopy closure estimates with GreenOrbs: Sustainable sensing in the forest. In Proc. ACM SenSys 2009, Berkeley, USA, Nov. 4–6, 2009, pp.99–112.

  10. GreenOrbs Project. http://greenorbs.org/, 2010.

  11. OceanSense Project. http://www.cse.ust.hk/∼liu/Ocean/index.html, 2010.

  12. Li J, Jannotti J, Couto D S J D et al. A scalable location service for geographic ad hoc routing. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2000, Boston, USA, Aug. 6–11, 2000, pp.120–130.

  13. Kortuem G, Schneider J, Preuitt D et al. When peer-to-peer comes face-to-face: Collaborative peer-to-peer computing in mobile ad hoc networks. In Proc. Peer-to-Peer Computing, Linkoping, Sweden, Aug. 27–29, 2001, pp.75–91.

  14. Patwari N, Ash J N, Kyperountas S et al. Locating the nodes: Cooperative localization in wireless sensor networks. IEEE Signal Processing Magazine, 2005, 22(4): 54–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Sayed A H, Tarighat A, Khajehnouri N. Network-based wireless location: Challenges faced in developing techniques for accurate wireless location information. IEEE Signal Processing Magazine, 2005, 22(4): 24–40.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Karp B, Kungy H T. GPSR: Greedy perimeter stateless routing for wireless networks. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2000, Boston, USA, Aug. 6–11, 2000, pp.243–254.

  17. Alzoubi K, Li X Y, Wang Y et al. Geometric spanners for wireless ad hoc networks. IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems (TPDS), 2003, 14(4): 408–421.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Li N, Hou J C. Localized topology control algorithms for heterogeneous wireless networks. IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (TON), 2005, 13(6): 1313–1324.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Cardei M, Du D Z. Improving wireless sensor network lifetime through power aware organization. Wireless Networks (TON), 2005, 11(3): 333–340.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Xue F, Kumar P R. On the θ-coverage and connectivity of large random networks. IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking (TON), 2006, 14(SI): 2289–2299.

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  21. Li X Y, Wan P J, Frieder O. Coverage in wireless ad hoc sensor networks. IEEE Transactions on Computers, 2003, 52(6): 753–763.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Fang Q, Gao J, Guibas L J. Locating and bypassing routing holes in sensor networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM, Hong Kong, China, March 7–11, 2004, pp.2458–2468.

  23. Abbasi A A, Younis M. A survey on clustering algorithms for wireless sensor networks. Computer Communications, 2007, 30: 2826–2841.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Savvides A, Han C, Strivastava M B. Dynamic fine-grained localization in ad-hoc networks of sensors. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2001, Rome, Italy, 2001, pp.166–179.

  25. Seidel S Y, Rappaport T S. 914 MHz path loss prediction models for indoor wireless communications in multifloored buildings. IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, 1992, 40(2): 209–217.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Priyantha N B, Chakraborty A, Balakrishnan H. The cricket location-support system. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2000, Boston, USA, Aug. 6–11, 2000, pp.32–43.

  27. Whitehouse K, Culler D. Calibration as parameter estimation in sensor networks. In Proc. ACM WSNA 2002, Atlanta, USA, Sep. 28, 2008, pp.59–67.

  28. Girod L, Estrin D. Robust range estimation using acoustic and multimodal sensing. In Proc. IROS 2001, Maui, USA, Oct. 29-Nov. 3, 2001, pp.1312–1320.

  29. Peng C, Shen G, Zhang Y et al. BeepBeep: A high accuracy acoustic ranging system using COTS mobile devices. In Proc. ACM SenSys 2007, Sydney, Australia, Nov. 6–9, 2007, pp.59–72.

  30. Priyantha N B, Miu A, Balakrishnan H, Teller S. The cricket compass for context-aware mobile applications. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2001, Rome, Italy, 2001, pp.1–14.

  31. Nasipuri A, Li K. A directionality based location discovery scheme for wireless sensor networks. In Proc. WSNA 2002, Atlanta, USA, Sep. 28, 2002, pp.105–111.

  32. Niculescu D, Nath B. Ad hoc positioning system (APS) using AoA. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2003, San Francisco, USA, March 30-April 3, 2003, pp.1734–1743.

  33. Doherty L, Pister K S J, Ghaoui L E. Convex position estimation in wireless sensor networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM, Anchorage, USA, April 22–26, 2001, pp.1655–1663.

  34. Galstyan A, Krishnamachari B, Lerman K, Pattem S. Distributed online localization in sensor networks using a moving target. In Proc. ACM/IEEE IPSN, Berkeley, USA, April 26–27, 2002, pp.61–70.

  35. He T, Huang C, Blum B M et al. Range-free localization schemes in large scale sensor networks. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2003, San Diego, USA, Sep. 14–19, 2003, pp.81–95.

  36. Kleinrock L, Silvester J A. Optimum transmission radii for packet radio networks or why six is a magic number. In Proc. IEEE National Telecommunications Conference, Birmingham, USA, Dec. 3–6, 1978, pp.4.3.1–4.3.5.

  37. Nagpal R, Shrobe H, Bachrach J. Organizing a global coordinate system from local information on an ad hoc sensor network. In Proc. ACM/IEEE IPSN 2003, Palo Alto, USA, April 22–23, 2003, pp.333–348.

  38. Lim H, Hou J C. Localization for anisotropic sensor networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2005, Miami, USA, March 13–17, 2005, pp.138–149.

  39. Wang Y, Gao J, Mitchell J. Boundary recognition in sensor networks by topological methods. In Proc. ACM MobiCom, Los Angeles, USA, Sept. 23–29, 2006, pp.122–133.

  40. Li M, Liu Y. Rendered path: Range-free localization in anisotropic sensor networks with holes. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2007, Montreal, Canada, Sep. 9–14, 2007, pp.51–62.

  41. Ni L M, Liu Y, Lau Y C, Patil A. LANDMARC: Indoor location sensing using active RFID. ACM Wireless Networks, 2004, 10(6): 701–710.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  42. Bulusu N, Heidemann J, Estrin D. GPS — Less low cost outdoor localization for very small devices. IEEE Personal Communications Magazine, 2000, 7(5): 28–34.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  43. Gezici S, Tian Z, Giannakis G B et al. Localization via ultra-wideband radios. IEEE Signal Processing Magazine, 2005, 22(4): 70–84.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  44. Nanotron Technologies. http://www.nanotron.com.

  45. Shang Y, Ruml W, Zhang Y, Fromherz M P J. Localization from mere connectivity. In Proc. ACM MobiHoc 2003, Annapolis, USA, June 1–3, 2003, pp.201–212.

  46. Bachrach J, Taylor C. Localization in Sensor Networks. Handbook of Sensor Networks: Algorithms and Architectures, Stojmenovic I (ed.), Wiley, 2005.

  47. Niculescu D, Nath B. Ad hoc positioning system (APS). In Proc. IEEE GLOBECOM 2001, San Antonio, USA, Nov. 25–29, 2001, pp.407–415.

  48. Niculescu D, Nath B. DV based positioning in ad hoc networks. Journal of Telecommunication Systems, 2003, 22(1–4): 267–280.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  49. Whitehouse K, Woo A, Karlof C, Jiang F, Culler D. The effects of ranging noise on multi-hop localization: An empirical study. In Proc. ACM/IEEE IPSN 2005, Los Angeles, USA, April 24–27, 2005, No.10.

  50. Niculescu D, Nath B. Error characteristics of ad hoc positioning systems (APS). In Proc. ACM MobiHoc 2004, Tokyo, Japan, May 24–26, 2004, pp.20–30.

  51. Moore D, Leonard J, Rus D, Teller S. Robust distributed network localization with noisy range measurements. In Proc. ACM SenSys 2004, Baltimore, USA, Nov. 3–5, 2004, pp.50–61.

  52. Goldenberg D, Bihler P, Cao M et al. Localization in sparse networks using sweeps. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2006, Los Angeles, USA, Sep. 23–29, 2006, pp.110–121.

  53. Capkun S, Hamdi M, Hubaux J P. GPS-free positioning in mobile ad hoc networks. In Proc. Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, Hawaii, USA, Jan. 3–6, 2001.

  54. Yang Z, Liu Y. Quality of trilateration: Confidence based iterative localization. In Proc. IEEE ICDCS 2008, Beijing, China, June 17–20, pp.446–453.

  55. Wang X, Luo J, Li S et al. Component based localization in sparse wireless ad hoc and sensor networks. In Proc. IEEE ICNP 2008, Orlando, USA, Oct. 19–22, pp.288–297.

  56. Youssef M, Mah M, Agrawala A K. Challenges: Device-free passive localization for wireless environments. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2007, Montreal, Canada, Sept. 9–14, 2007, pp.222–229.

  57. Liu Y, Chen L, Pei J, Chen Q, Zhao Y. Mining frequent trajectory patterns for activity monitoring using radio frequency tag arrays. In Proc. PerCom 2007, New York, USA, Mar. 19–23, 2007, pp.37–46.

  58. Fontana R J, Gunderson S J. Ultra-wideband precision asset location system. In Proc. Ultra Wideband Systems and Technologies, Baltimore, USA, May 20–23, 2002, pp.147–150.

  59. Lanzisera S, Lin D, Pister K. RF time of flight ranging for wireless sensor network localization. In Proc. WISES 2006, Vienna, Austria, June 30, 2006.

  60. Trees H L V. Detection, Estimation and Modulation Theory, Part I. New York: Wiley, 1968.

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  61. Liu J, Zhang Y, Zhao F. Robust distributed node localization with error management. In Proc. ACM MobiHoc 2006, Florence, Italy, May 22–25, 2006, pp.250–261.

  62. Spirito M A. On the accuracy of cellular mobile station location estimation. IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology (TVT), 2001, 50(3): 674–685.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  63. Savarese C, Langendoen K, Rabaey J. Robust positioning algorithms for distributed ad-hoc wireless sensor networks. In Proc. USENIX Annual Technical Conference, June 10–15, 2002, pp.317–327.

  64. Liu D, Ning P, Du W. Attack-resistant location estimation in sensor networks. In Proc. ACM/IEEE IPSN 2005, Los Angeles, USA, April 24–27, 2005, No.13.

  65. Li Z, Trappe W, Zhang Y, Nath B. Robust statistical methods for securing wireless localization in sensor networks. In Proc. ACM/IEEE IPSN 2005, Los Angeles, USA, April 24–27, 2005, No. 12.

  66. Kung H T, Lin C K, Lin T H, Vlah D. Localization with snap-inducing shaped residuals (SISR): Coping with errors in measurement. In Proc. ACM MobiCom 2009, Beijing, China, Sept. 20–25, 2009, pp.333–344.

  67. Jian L, Yang Z, Liu Y. Beyond triangle inequality: Sifting noisy and outlier ranging measurements. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2010, San Diego, USA, March 15–19, 2010. (To Appear)

  68. Eren T, Goldenberg D K, Whiteley W et al. Rigidity, computation, and randomization in network localization. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM, Hong Kong, China, March 7–11, 2004, pp.2673–2684.

  69. Hendrickson B. Conditions for unique graph realizations. SIAM Journal of Computing, 1992, 21(1): 65–84.

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  70. Jackson B, Jordan T. Connected rigidity matroids and unique realizations of graphs. Journal of Combinatorial Theory Series B, 2005, 94(1): 1–29.

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  71. Laman G. On graphs and rigidity of plane skeletal structures. Journal of Engineering Mathematics, 1970, 4(4): 331–340.

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  72. Jacobs D J, Hendrickson B. An algorithm for two-dimensional rigidity percolation: The pebble game. Journal of Computational Physics, 1997, 137(2): 346–365.

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  73. Hopcroft J E, Tarjan R E. Finding the triconnected components of a graph. Technical Report, Department of Computer Science, Cornell University, TR 140, 1972.

  74. Lovasz L, Yemini Y. On generic rigidity in the plane. SIAM Journal on Algebraic and Discrete Methods, 1982, 3(1): 91–98.

    Article  MATH  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  75. Aspnes J, Eren T, Goldenberg D K et al. A theory of network localization. IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing (TMC), 2006, 5(12): 1663–1678.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  76. Yang Z, Liu Y, Li X Y. Beyond trilateration: On the localizability of wireless ad-hoc networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2009, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, April 19–25, 2009.

  77. Goldenberg D, Krishnamurthy A, Maness W et al. Network localization in partially localizable networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2005, Miami, USA, March 13–17, 2005, pp.313–326.

  78. Yang Z, Liu Y. Understanding node localizability of wireless ad-hoc networks. In Proc. IEEE INFOCOM 2010, San Diego, USA, March 15–19, 2010. (To appear)

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China

    Yunhao Liu (Member, ACM, Senior Member, IEEE), Zheng Yang (Student Member, ACM, IEEE), Xiaoping Wang (Student Member, IEEE) & Lirong Jian (Student Member, IEEE)

Authors
  1. Yunhao Liu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Zheng Yang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Xiaoping Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Lirong Jian
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yunhao Liu.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Liu, Y., Yang, Z., Wang, X. et al. Location, Localization, and Localizability. J. Comput. Sci. Technol. 25, 274–297 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11390-010-9324-2

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11390-010-9324-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation