Optimum Transmission Policies for Energy Harvesting Sensor Networks Powered by a Mobile Control Center

Abstract

Wireless energy transfer, namely, radio frequency (RF)-based energy harvesting, is a potential way to prolong the lifetime of energy-constrained devices, especially in wireless sensor networks. However, due to huge propagation attenuation, its energy efficiency is regarded as the biggest bottleneck to wide applications. It is critical to find appropriate transmission policies to improve the global energy efficiency in this kind of system. To this end, this paper focuses on the sensor networks scenario, where a mobile control center powers the sensors by RF signal and also collects information from them. Two related schemes, called harvest-and-use scheme and harvest-store-use scheme, are investigated. In the harvest-and-use scheme, as a benchmark, both constant and adaptive transmission modes from sensors are discussed. In the harvest-store-use scheme, we propose a new concept, the best opportunity for wireless energy transfer, and use it to derive an explicit closed-form expression of optimal transmission policy. It is shown by simulation that a considerable improvement in terms of energy efficiency can be obtained with the help of the transmission policies developed in this paper. Furthermore, the transmission policies are also discussed under the constraint of fixed information rate. The minimal required power, the performance loss from the new constraint, and the effect of fading are then presented.