QoI-Aware Data Collection for Mobile Users in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract: Ubiquitous data collection enables mobile users to collect data from the surrounding wireless sensors along their walks. However, the limited contact time and the wireless capacity constrain the amount of data that can be collected by the mobile users. Quality of Service (QoS) becomes very important for mobile users to collect sensing data that can maximize their information value. To the best of our knowledge, we are the first to propose a distributed algorithm that can support QoS ubiquitous data collection for multiple mobile users. Our distributed algorithm constructs the data collection trees adaptively to the dynamic moving speeds and the available capacity of the mobile users. It allocates capacity for receiving high priority data to maximize the information value with low communication overheads. Our algorithm supports smooth data collection for multiple mobile users with independent movements. We provide analysis and extensive simulations to evaluate the information value, energy efficiency and scalability of our distributed solution. The results showed that our distributed algorithm can improve information value up to 50% and reduce energy consumption to half compared with the existing approach. Our algorithm also scales perfectly well with increasing number of mobile users and moving speeds.