Dynamic Power Management in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

newline Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are permeating in all the domains; industrial, newlineenvironmental, medical, biological as they are self-organizing and do not require control, newlinethey are self-monitoring, easily deployable, require low power, low cost, remain for newlinesensing the domain and providing information, which can be used for controlling and newlinemonitoring the resources of that domain in order to perform some specific operation. newlineDespite the exceptional fast growing applications and attractive features of WSNs, power newlinebecomes the main constraint for lifetime and performance, as they are battery operated. newlineActually, the lifetime of a WSN depends on the required sensing, computation and newlinecommunication in an application. Many of the researchers are trying to reduce the power newlineconsumption at the architecture level, circuit level, logic level, network level (e.g. MAC, newlinerouting, clustering, coverage, localization, modulation, cross layer level), newlinehardware/software level, technology level and operating system level. Although newlineresearchers are continuously providing the solutions to the energy limitations of sensor newlinenetworks, but still there are lacunas in existing solutions. Further exploration of the newlineapproaches is required, which can provide new dimensions to researchers.Limited work has been done in minimizing the energy at the operational level, i.e. newlineoperating system (OS) level. The application specific and flexibilities characteristics of OS newlinecan be used for achieving more energy efficient sensor node. newlineA dynamic power management (DPM) technique at operational level can effectively newlineoversee the power consumption and prolong the lifespan of a sensor node. The DPM can newlinevary the node power consumption dynamically within finite time duration by operating the newlinesensor node components in different power modes or putting them in sleep/off mode. It newlinehelps the power aware operating system for transitioning the system components in newlinedifferent power states according to input data statistics. An energy efficient sensor node newlinesignificantly improves the lifetime of a network.