Standby Redundancy for Reliability Improvement of Wireless Sensor Network

Abstract

Recent advances on low-cost, low-power and multifunctional solutions of semiconductor devices leads to a fast development of wireless sensor network. In particular, wireless mesh network covers a large area and introduces the concept of fault tolerance, it means that if a sensor node fails, the entire network will not fail. The diffusion of dense networks highlights the importance of the root node that must keep the entire network connected. Generally, in case of failure, the solution is to repair the faulty block or most frequently the replacement by a new one. However, this procedure may take considerable time and high cost. It is therefore necessary to create a stable and reliable root node in order to reduce downtime and maintenance costs. This paper focuses on reliability prediction of a root node using two different handbooks MIL-HDBK-217F and Telcordia SR-332 and the introduction of a standby redundancy configuration. This configuration improves the reliability of the root node, guaranteeing network connectivity and maintenance cost reduction.