IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS VOLUME: 47 NO.
2 FEB 2017
Preprocessing Design in Pyroelectric Infrared
Sensor-Based Human-Tracking System:
On Sensor Selection and Calibration
Jiang Lu, Member, IEEE, Ting Zhang, Fei Hu, and Qi Hao
AbstractThis paper presents an information-gain-based sen-
sor selection approach as well as a sensor sensing probability
model-based calibration process for multihuman tracking in
distributed binary pyroelectric infrared sensor networks. This
research includes three contributions: 1) choose the subset of
sensors that can maximize the mutual information between sen-
sors and targets; 2) find the sensor sensing probability model to
represent the sensing space for sensor calibration; and 3) pro-
vide a factor graph-based message passing scheme for distributed
tracking. Our approach can find the solution for sensor selection
to optimize the performance of tracking. The sensing probability
model is efficiently optimized through the calibration process in
order to update the parameters of sensor positions and rotations.
An application for mobile calibration and tracking is developed.
Simulation and experimental results are provided to validate the
proposed framework.
Index TermsBinary sensor networks, calibration, factor
graph, information gain, matrix factorization, message passing,
multiple human tracking, sensor selection.
I. I NTRODUCTION
NDOOR multihuman tracking has many applications
I in surveillance, security, healthcare, and energy-efficient
buildings [1][4]. Recently, binary sensing technologies have
enabled the development of a distributed binary sensor system
for target tracking and recognition [5], [6]. The advantages of
a distributed binary tracking system include: 1) system scal-
ability to a large number of sensors; 2) system robustness to
local failures; and 3) a system that is low cost with small
sensor communication overhead.
In a complete sensor-based tracking system, typically, pre-
processing is needed before tracking in order to achieve higher
Manuscript received April 7, 2015; revised July 27, 2015; accepted
November 2, 2015. This paper was recommended by Associate
Editor M.-Y. Lee.
J. Lu is with the Department of Computer Engineering, University of
Houston at Clear Lake, Houston, TX 77058 USA (e-mail: luj@uhcl.edu).
T. Zhang and F. Hu are with the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487 USA (e-mail:
tzhang21@crimson.ua.edu; fei@eng.ua.edu).
Q. Hao is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, South University
of Science and Technology of China, Shenzhen, Guangdong 518055, China
(e-mail: hao.q@sustc.edu.cn).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available
online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TSMC.2016.2523914
2168-2216 c 2016 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
1
tracking performance. There are two main preprocessing steps:
1) sensor selection and 2) calibration.
Sensor selection is an important problem in human track-
ing based on distributed sensor networks. As sensors become
ubiquitous, coupled with the increasing demand for a shorter
processing time and less resources, it becomes important to
perform selective fusion so that the decision can be made in
a timely and efficient manner. The need for sensor selection
is further demonstrated by the burden of an increasingly large
volume of sensory data and by the variability of sensor oper-
ations over time and location. We can reduce the amount of
data and improve fusion accuracy by selecting proper sensors
in a certain location at a certain time.
Calibration is another important issue in distributed track-
ing sensor networks. The tracking algorithms need to read
the geometric parameters of sensors: position and orientation.
The estimation errors of sensor parameters result in degraded
tracking performance. This problem is even worse in multi-
ple target tracking, where the errors of one tracker propagate
into other trackers through the data-to-target association pro-
cess [7]. Therefore, a successful distributed tracking system
requires a calibration component that can estimate the sensor
geometric parameters accurately.
This paper presents a framework for distributed tracking
with dynamic sensor selection and calibration using binary
pyroelectric infrared (PIR) sensors. The contributions of this
paper include two aspects.
1) Information-Gain-Based Sensor Selection: We proposed
an information-gain-based sensor selection method for
selecting sensors that can maximize the mutual infor-
mation between sensors and targets. The multiple target
information gain is derived and formulated. Given the
localizations of targets, we prove that subregion sensor
selection is better than the whole-space sensor selection
by using less sensors with similar tracking errors.
2) Sensing Probability Model for Calibration: The calibra-
tion method updates the probability model by using the
sparse measurements. A mobile application is developed
to customize calibration paths. It allows the users to do
calibration without covering the entire sampling space.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section II
reviews the related work. Section III provides the big picture
of our preprocessing method as well as the system model.
Section IV presents an information-gain-based sensor selec-
tion method. Section V provides the sensing probability model
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
2 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS
and factor analysis-based calibration. In Section VI, we give
the factor graph model-based distributed belief propagation
framework for multiple target tracking. Section VII provides
the simulation and experimental results. Finally, Section VIII
concludes this paper.
II. R ELATED W ORK
Multihuman tracking and recognition have been devel-
oped for wireless PIR sensor networks [6], [8], [9].
Furthermore, human activity learning using context is also
studied [10], [11]. However, no previous studies in PIR sensor
networks clearly present the sensor selection scheme to give
the optimal solution.
The existing methods for sensor selection can be gener-
ally divided into two groups: 1) the Bayesian-based methods
and 2) the information-based methods. The Bayesian-based
sensor selection considers the whole process as an optimiza-
tion problem to find the best solution among all possible
sensor combination. In [12], a Bayesian I-optimal approach
is used. Giraud and Jouvencel [13] proposed a geometrical
approach for the sensor selection. Garnett et al. [14] con-
structed covariance functions and performed Gaussian process
inference over the functions whose domains are a power set.
Ni and Pottie [15] used a Bayesian detection approach to
select a subset of sensors. These methods define the selec-
tion process as probability problems. The sensor selection
can be represented as conditional probability given the sen-
sor observations and background information. Most methods
of information-based sensor selection in tracking problems
compute the distribution of target locations and then select
sensors which give the minimum entropy of the target loca-
tion distribution [16][18]. In [19], the KullbackLeibler and
Chernoff sensor selection criteria is provided for event detec-
tion in wireless sensor network. Zhang and Ji [20] presented
an interesting approach to calculate information gain between
two sensors. In our research, the information-based method
is chosen for sensor selection. We only use the binary codes
generated by sensors to estimate the information gain before
and after adding sensors. Our method also considers the tar-
get locations as prior knowledge for sensor selection to narrow
down the coding space.
In most sensor networks, the objective functions of
the calibration can be constructed through two approaches:
1) the model-based method or 2) the data-driven method. In the
model-based framework, measures of sensor readings can be
predicted based on the sensor models. The sensor parameters
are then self-tuned to reduce the prediction errors [21][23].
In the data-driven framework, measures of sensor readings
are correlated with regression functions of sensor parameters.
A two-stage process is usually involved: 1) identification of
regression function parameters and 2) fine-tuning of sensor
parameters [24][26].
The advantages of data-driven methods include their inde-
pendence of sensor physical models and the maturity of
related algorithms. However, those methods usually assume
slow varying stimulus sources and the existence of well con-
ditioned regression functions between sensor readings and
sensor parameters. In this paper, we use the model-based
calibration. The probability of sensor sensing model can
be updated by gradient descent algorithm. Then, the senor
parameters can be computed from the updated sensor sensing
probability model.
The above preprocessing tasks (sensor selection and cali-
bration) prepare us for PIR sensor-based multihuman tracking.
We will briefly introduce our tracking scheme here to illus-
trate the effects such as reducing tracking errors after sensor
selection and calibration. We will use factor graph to model
our tracking process since factor graph can well represent the
message passing process among distributed PIR sensors.
Factor graphs are a straightforward generalization of the
Tanner graph of Wiberg et al. [27], [28]. Tanner [29] intro-
duced the bipartite graphs to describe families of codes which
are generalizations of the low-density parity-check (LDPC)
codes of Gallager [30] and also described the sum-product
algorithm in this setting. Factor graphs take these graph-
theoretic models one step further, by applying them to func-
tions. From the factor-graph perspective, a Tanner graph for
a code represents a particular factorization of the characteris-
tic function of the code. Factor-graph-based tracking has been
used in many applications. In inertial navigation systems, the
factor graph has been used for information fusion [31]. A mul-
tiple hypothesis tracking with factor graph has been proposed
in [32]. The factor graph-based association scheme over joint
probabilistic data association has been developed for closely
moving targets in [33]. In this paper, the factor graph is an
undirected graph which is efficiently used in message passing
algorithms.
III. S YSTEM M ODEL
A. Binary Sensor System
The low-cost, low-power PIR sensors are used in our
binary sensor system. Simple binary bits are generated, which
represent the sensors as triggered (1) or not (0), as
shown in Fig. 1(a). The advantages of binary sensing include:
1) tolerance of low signal-to-noise ratios and 2) reduction
of data throughput and communication overhead. We have
developed pyroelectric sensor nodes for human tracking and
recognition. Each sensor node contains two PIR sensors.
Fresnel lens arrays and masks are used to change the field of
view (FOV) of each sensor. As illustrated in Fig. 1(b), the FOV
of one sensor node is segmented into many small partitions.
Each partition is associated with a sequence of binary code,
e.g., 10, 01, and 11. When human subjects walk through
the FOV, the sensor node can generate the binary sequence
that can be analyzed to find the location, gesture and activity
information of targets.
Now, let the M sensors, S = S1 , S2 , . . . , SM , segment the
tracking space into many small regions. Each region is asso-
ciated with an M-bit binary code. Fig. 2(a) shows an example
of space encoding by three distributed binary PIR sensors.
With such a space encoding scheme, each code measurement
is associated with one or multiple possible regions. Therefore,
a space decoding scheme has to be developed. In [6], we have
used data-to-target association methods for space decoding.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM
Fig. 1. Illustration of (a) binary multiplex sensing and (b) two coded masks
for PIR sensors.
Fig. 2. Illustration of (a) space encoding by three distributed binary PIR
sensors and (b) ideal gridded space encoding case with one target tracking.
The measurement decoding converts codewords into the loca-
tions. This space encoding/decoding theme is used for target
tracking.
Assume the tracking space is segmented into N small
regions. Then, the binary codes for these N grids are C =
c1 , c2 , . . . , cN . ci is an M 1 binary string. An approximate
way to represent these small regions are grids. A simple ideal
example of gridded space encoding with one target tracking
by M = 4 sensors is given in Fig. 2(b). This gridded ideal
space encoding method is used in sensor calibration.
B. Sensor Selection
Presence of multiple targets will cause more ambiguities for
such a binary sensor system. In order to optimize the sensor
deployment to achieve accurate tracking, sensor selection has
to be made. On one hand, multiple sensors have to be triggered
to track the whole trajectory; on the other hand, we should
not trigger too many sensors to avoid high communication
overhead and sensor energy waste.
Assume that there are M binary sensors in the sensor net-
work, and the whole tracking space is segmented into N
Vi (i , i ) Wi Gi
2 +
Wi
+
Gi
(5)
small grids. Also, assume that the states of K targets are
X = (X 1 , X 2 , . . . , X K ). The state can contain the location and
is L1 norm, and and are the coefficients of the
velocity information of the target. The objective of the sen-
sor selection is to select a subset U of m sensors, U S, to
maximize the mutual information of X and U
arg max I(X; U)
US
where I(X; U) = H(X) H(X|U), and H(X|U) is the
conditional entropy given the subset U.
However, selecting the subset U at one time is difficult.
We have to explicitly consider all the possible combinations
from S, which will be computationally inefficient. Thus, we
provide a dynamic sensor selection theme which computes
3
the information gain by given previous subset U and current
adding sensor Si . Mathematically, the conditional information
gain (CIG) is defined as
     
J(X, U) I X; Si |U = H X|U H X|U , Si (2)
where Si is selected from U and U = U Si .
We still wish to maximize the dynamic CIG to find the
sensor Si which provides the maximum information to min-
imize the tracking error of the system. When the number of
sensors m is not given, the dynamic sensor selection process
stops adding sensors when the CIG is less than a threshold
J(X, U) (3)
where is a small value less than 1.
C. Calibration
Let the whole system sampling geometry be G(, ), where
G(, ) = g1 (1 , 1 ), g2 (2 , 2 ), . . . , gm (m , m ). It is deter-
mined by the positions and orientations of the sensors.
With such a sampling geometry, we can achieve tracking for
multiple targets [6].
The goal of calibration is to find these parameters that can
perform the best tracking results, i.e., minimizing the track-
ing errors. In this paper, we propose a new way to achieve
calibration: instead of minimizing the tracking errors between
the measured and predicted positions, we minimize the error
between the measured and predicted sampling geometries.
Let the measured sensing probability matrix be V. It can be
approximately represented by two nonnegative matrices, the
predicted sensing probability basis matrix G RRT + and
weighting matrix W RFR + , that is
V V = WG (4)
where the measured sampling probability matrix V(, ) can
be calculated from G(, ) and the number of basis in G can
be given by R < (FT/(F + T)). The initial predicted posi-
tions and orientations of sensors are known to be prior
knowledge.
The cost function of calibration for the sensor i, in Euclidean
distance form, can be written as
Ei (i , i ) =
where
penalty terms of discriminant information. We attempt to find
the Vi = Wi Gi with optimal parameters i ,i that can
arg min Ei (i , i ) s.t. Wi 0, Gi 0. (6)
i ,i
(1)
The whole calibration process is illustrated in Fig. 3. The
predicted sensing probability basis matrix G will be updated
by giving the measurement sensing probability matrix V. Then
the calibration parameters can be computed from the optimized
reconstructed sensing probability matrix V . In this process,
the parameters of each sensor will be calibrated separately.
The details will be given in Section V.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.

4 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS

Fig. 3. Illustration of matrix factorization-based calibration process.

Fig. 5. System diagram of distributed multiple target tracking with sensor
selection and calibration.

not all of them provide useful information that improves the

estimate. Sensor selection aims to select the optimal subset of
sensors that give the best tracking performance.

Fig. 4. Illustration of the sum-product update rule for factor graph. A. Sensor Node Information Measure
When the sensors are deployed in the distributed sensor
network, the observation space is segmented into many small
D. Message Passing
regions similar as shown in Fig. 2(a). Assume the number of
Because our tracking algorithm is based on message pass- regions is N. Generally, m binary sensors in subset U mean that
ing, here we briefly explain its principle. Our message passing each region can be represented as an m-bit binary code. There
algorithm uses a factor graph. Let f x denote the message are 2m 1 codes (without zeroes), Cm = (cm 1 , c2 , . . . , c2m 1 ),
m m
sent from fusion node f to variable node x. Let xf denote p
where cq denotes the qth binary code which is generated by p
the message sent from variable node x to fusion node f . Also, binary sensors. Each code has the probability of detecting one
let ne(x) denote the set of neighbors of a given node x in the target as
factor graph. As shown in Fig. 4, the sum-product message    
1
passing algorithm can be illustrated as two expressions i = m,
p Xj |cm i 1, . . . , 2m 1 (9)
 ni
xf (x) = uj x (x) (7) where nm m
i is the number of regions associated with code ci ,
uj ne(x)\ f m
and Xj denotes the jth location with code ci . Then, the
  
f x (x) = f (v1 , . . . , vM ) vi f (vi ) . (8) information of locating one target given m binary sensors is
v1 vM vi ne( f )\x 1
2 m
     
HU X|Cm = i H X|C = ci
p cm m m
The factor graph-based message passing algorithm for target
i=1
tracking will be discussed in details in Section VI. m 1
2 nm
 i
   
= p cm
i p Xj |cm
i log2 p Xj |ci .
m
(10)
E. System Diagram
i=1 j=1
The whole system diagram is illustrated in Fig. 5. By select-
Here, we denote HU (X|Cm ) = H(X|U).
ing the sensor set U from sensors S, we have the knowledge
For the case of multiple targets tracking, the probability of K
of sampling geometry G(, ). Such a set of sensors can gen-
targets locating in K regions with one of (2m 1) possible
erate the codes for the tracking space. When the targets are
codes is given by
walking through the encoded space, a binary event sequence is
generated. A calibration process will be used to update sensing     K 
 
probability models. In the meantime, the distributed message p X 1,...,K cm
i = p X k cm
i (11)
passing algorithm is performed for multiple target tracking. k=1

The target states will be updated during the message passing where we assume K nm i . As the tracking processes
procedure. for all targets are independent, we can rewrite (11) as
In the next few sections, we will provide the details for each p(X 1,...,K |cm
i ) = p(X |ci ) . The conditional entropy for K
1 m K

module of Fig. 5. targets given subset U is defined as

     
1) Formulate the information-gain-based sensor selection H X 1,...,K U = HU X 1,...,K Cm
problem via information gain in PIR sensor networks.
nm K

   
m 1
2
2) Provide the sensing probability model for calibration,  m i
k m
and use nonnegative matrix factorization algorithm to = p c p X c i j i
update the model. i=1 j=1 k=1
K 

3) Build a factor graph-based distributed message passing   

k m
model for multiple target tracking. log2 p Xj ci
k=1
m
IV. I NFORMATION -G AIN -BASED S ENSOR S ELECTION m 1
2 ni
 m    K
Given the distributed binary sensor network, we wish to find = K p ci p Xj1 cm
i
i=1 j=1
the minimum subset of sensors that can provide the best track-   
ing estimation. Among all available sensors in the network, log2 p Xj1 cm
i . (12)
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM
Fig. 6. Illustration of sensor selection process.
Please note that 2m 1 are the maximum possible codes
that m sensors can generate. The actual number of different
codes is less than or equal to 2m 1.
B. Conditional Information Gain
As given in (2), the objective function of CIG is the gain of
conditional entropy between the current subset U and previous
subset U . We aim to find a sensor Si , which is not included
in subset U , to maximize the CIG I(X; Si |U ). The sensor
selection process will terminate when the maximum CIG is
smaller than a threshold . In other words, the added sensor
does not provide much information for more accurate tracking
in the network. The process terminates when the number of
selection steps reaches the desired number. The process of CIG
is shown in Fig. 6. At each step, one sensor is selected based
on the maximum CIG.
Here, we give two properties of sensor selection in our
binary sensor system.
Theorem 1: Given a subset of m sensors, U =
(S1 , S2 , . . . , Sm ), the information gain (i.e., mutual informa-
tion) is a summation of all CIGs, and it is upper bounded by
entropy H(X).
Proof: Based on the chain rule of mutual information, we
have
I(X; U) = I(X; S1 ) + I(X; S2 |S1 ) + I(X; S3 |S1 , S2 ) +
+ I(X; Sm |S1 , S2 , . . . , Sm1 )
= H(X) HU (X|Cm ) H(X).
Theorem 2: Let U1 and U2 be two sets with different sensor
orders from the subset U. Then
I(X; U1 ) = I(X; U2 ) = I(X; U).
Proof: By Theorem 1, the mutual information between
targets and sensor sets U1 and U2 can be written as
I(X; U1 ) = H(X) H(X|U1 )
I(X; U2 ) = H(X) H(X|U2 ).
Since right-side terms of the two equations are the same,
we can conclude that I(X; U1 ) = I(X; U2 ).
In our problem, the sensor selection is a dependent process.
Based on Theorems 1 and 2, we can see that our CIG process
is not a Markov chain. That means steps i in the process needs
all the information of previous steps from 1 to i 1 instead
of just step i 1.
5
Fig. 7. Illustration of sensing probability model of calibration.
C. Subregion Sensor Selection
The CIG is related to target location and sampling geom-
etry. So far, the CIG for sensor selection is computed based
on the whole tracking space. However, it is not necessary to
maximize the CIG in the whole space in many cases. For
example, for one target case, it is more efficient to maximize
the CIG in a subregion space based on the tracking estimation
of the target location. In another case, if we have the prior
knowledge of target trajectories, we can maximize the CIGs
of several subregions. That is, when we select sensors, we use
the subregions in which targets will appear more likely than
others to maximize the CIG.
V. M ATRIX FACTORIZATION -BASED C ALIBRATION
A. Sensing Probability Model
As we described in Section III-A, the sensors segment the
space into multiple small regions. Fig. 7 shows the FOVs of
one sensor Si and its sensing probability model. The dashed
lines segment the space into three small regions. In the gray
region, targets can be detected. The dotted lines are the cen-
ter lines of each small regions. The exact 1 or 0 occurs on
the dotted lines. Assume that the space is also gridded into
N uniformly distributed grids. It is known that each grid is
associated with one binary code. The probability of grid gi
with the code ci = 1 is P(ci = 1|gi ) = (/( + )), where
and can be the angles or the circular arcs with the origin at
the sensor, as shown in Fig. 7. The smaller is, the higher
detection probability we can gain. We also denote the detec-
(13) tion ratio = (/). In this way, the whole tracking space
can be represented by a probability matrix Vi , where
11 1nc
. .. ..
Vi =
.. .
. . (15)
(14)
nr 1 nr nc
The nr and nc are the number of rows and columns, respec-
tively. For simplicity, let i indicate the detection ratio on
grid gi . By updating the probability matrix, the parameters,
orientation, and position of one sensor can be calibrated.
B. Sensor Calibration
Assume two grids g1 and g2 are selected from both sides
of the middle dotted line, as shown in Fig. 8(a). Let be
the fixed angle which represents the angle of each small FOV
region. 1 is the angle between g1 and the middle dotted line,
and 2 is the angle between g2 and the middle dotted line.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.

6 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS

Algorithm 1: Self-Calibration
Input: Binary measurements B, calibration paths P,
number of sensors m, and sampling geometry
G(, )
Output: ,
1 i 1;
2 while i < m do
3 Initialization: , ;
4 Wi , Gi PredictedProbFunc(P, gi (i , i ));
Fig. 8. Illustration of calibration with parameters. (a) Orientation. /* initialize */
(b) Positions. 5 Vi BinToProbFunc(Bi , P) ;
/* measurement */
6 Vi Wi Gi ; /* prediction */
Then is equal to 1 + 2 . When introducing the sensing 7 ei
Vi Vi
2 +
Wi
+
Gi
;
probability model and the detection ratio, we can rewrite as 8 while ei not convergent do
  V GT
1 2 9 Wi Wi Vi GiT ;
= + (16) i i
1 + 1 1 + 2 WT V
10 Gi Gi W Ti V Ti ;
i i
where 1 = (1 /( 1 )) and 2 = (2 /( 2 )). Note 11 end
that (1 /(1 + 1 )) is equal to 1 and (2 /(1 + 2 )) is 12 Vi Wi Gi ; /* reconstruction */
equal to 2 . 13 i , i CalibrationFunc(Vi );
Once we have 1 or 2 and the known positions of g1 or g2 , 14 i + +;
we can calculate the rotation angle i of the sensor. However, 15 end
the position of the sensor Si can be any location on the blue
circle. To calibrate the positions i of sensor Si , we select two
more grids g3 and g4 from both sides of the middle dotted line,
as shown in Fig. 8(b). Then, we have the triangle relationship VI. FACTOR G RAPH -BASED D ISTRIBUTED
M ESSAGE PASSING
2
d1S i
+ d2S
2
i
2d1Si d2Si cos(12 ) = d12
2
(17) To verify the efficiency of the proposed sensor selection
2
d3S i
+ d4S
2
i
2d3Si d4Si cos(34 ) = 2
d34 (18) scheme (refer back to Section IV) as well as the accuracy of
the sensor calibration (Section V), we need to apply them to
where dnSi denotes the distance between grid gn and sensor practical multihuman tracking applications and test the track-
Si , n = (1, . . . , 4). d12 denotes the distance between two grids ing effect to see if the proposed schemes can reduce tracking
g1 and g2 ; 12 is the angle that two grids g1 and g2 and errors. Therefore, in this section, we will provide our factor
sensor Si hold, which is represented as g1 Si g2 and can be graph-based message passing model, which is the critical part
calculated from (16). Then, the sensor Si can be located at the in our tracking scheme.
intersection point of blue and red circles. Because we have
known the positions of the four grids, by using (17) and (18), A. Factor Graph
the positions i of the sensor Si can be computed.
Fig. 9(a) shows the directed graph model-based multiple
target tracking with unknown data association. The hidden
C. Self-Calibration variable Vt is a Ot K measurement-to-tracker association
It is clear that if we know the measured probability matrix matrix, and is a multidimensional (Ot ) one-out-of-K random
Vi of the sensor Si , we can calibrate the parameters of the variable. Pd and Pfa are the probabilities of detection and false
sensor, as shown in Section V-B. In real applications, it is alarms, respectively. The joint probability function of X, Z,
time-consuming to cover all the grids when doing calibration and V is given by
process. Thus, we only use a few measurements in sensing p(X, Z, V) = p(Z|X, V)p(V)p(X)
probability matrix of a sensor. In other words, we can calibrate
T 
T
all sensors with a few trajectories. = p(Zt |Xt , Vt ) p(Vt )
We can use a matrix factorization to update the probability t=1 t=1
basis matrix G. The updated weighting matrix and sensing

T1
probability basis matrix can be used as initial matrices in p(Xt+1 |Xt ) p(X1 ) (19)
self-calibration algorithm. They can be obtained by using the t=1
information of predicted initial sampling geometry G(, )  t K j k Vtjk
and calibration paths P. Note that the binary readings can be where p(Zt |Xt , Vt ) = O
j=1 k=1 p(zt |xt ) .
converted into estimated probability measurement matrix V In a distributed PIR sensor system, the whole tracking pro-
based on the calibration paths P. An implementation of the cess can be seen as a message passing process. Therefore, we
self-calibration method is given in Algorithm 1. change the directed graph model into undirected factor graph.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.

LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM 7

Fig. 10. Illustration of (a) two layer PIR sensor node (sensor board and iris
Fig. 9. Illustration of (a) directed graph model and (b) undirected factor mote) and a wireless PIR sensor node with two coded masks and (b) PIR
graph model for tracking. sensor system testbed for multiple human tracking.

Fig. 9(b) shows the undirected factor graph of graphical model 2) For the messages flowing into variable nodes Vt and Xt
converted from directed graph model in Fig. 9(a).
Zt ft2 = 1 (31)
Based on (19), the potential functions of joint factors in the 
factor graph are ft2 Xt = ft2 Vt ft2 Zt ft2 f 3 Xt (32)
t
Vt
ft1 = (Vt ) = p(Vt ) (20) 
ft2 Vt = ft2 Xt ft2 Zt ft2 ft1 Vt . (33)
= (Zt , Xt , Vt ) = p(Zt |Xt , Vt )
ft2 (21)
Vt
p(X1 ), t = 1
ft = (Xt ) =
3
(22) 3) For the message flowing from Xt to Xt+1
1, t>1
(Xt+1 , Xt ) = p(Xt+1 |Xt ). (23) Xt Xt+1 = Xt1 Xt ft2 Xt f 3 Xt . (34)
t

The belief propagation message passing updates involve two

B. Distributed Message Passing operations: 1) multiplication and 2) summation. The multipli-
The target dynamic model and sensor observation model cation step is used to aggregate information from neighbor
can be written as nodes, as shown in (7). The summation step is used to
marginalize a certain node on the factor graph, as shown in (8).
Xt+1 = AXt + t
Zt = HXt + t (24) VII. P ERFORMANCE A NALYSIS
where and are zero-mean noises with = Q and E{T } A. Experiment Setup
E{ T } = R. For simplicity, we omit the time index t unless To verify the proposed distributed binary sensor system with
it is necessary sensor selection and calibration, we have developed the PIR
f 1 = (V) = p(V) sensor system testbed for multiple human tracking, as shown
in Fig. 10(b). Our PIR sensor-based binary sensing system
= PD (1 PD )K Pfa (1 Pfa ) (25) is a nonintrusive, scalable, and low-cost system. Fig. 10(a)
f = (Z, X, V) = p(Z|X, V)
2
shows the two-layer PIR sensor node with coded masks. The

O sensor board contains two PIR sensors, a signal conditioning
= N (z(i); Hx(V(i)), R) (26) circuit, and a programmable system on chip. The Iris mote,
i
with RF transceiver, is connected to sensor board through a
p(X1 ) = N (X1 ; AX0 , Q0 ), t = 1 51-pin connector. The sampling rate is 9 Hz. The PIR sensors
f 3 = (X) = are deployed on the walls to measure human presence. Results
1, t>1
are displayed on two big screens for visualization purpose.
(27) Fig. 11 illustrates the tracking experiment setup.
(Xt+1 , Xt ) = p(Xt+1 |Xt ) = N (Xt+1 ; AXt , Qt ) (28) Experiments are conducted in a 6 m 6 m observa-
tion space where 144 plastic floor tiles are deployed. The
where is the number of detections; is the number of false
size of each mat is about 0.5 m 0.5 m. Sixteen PIR sensor
alarms in ; O is the number of observations; x(V(i)) denotes
nodes (32 sensors) are deployed on four walls with pegboards.
the target state associated with observation i; and X0 and Q0
These sensor nodes are easy to move and are scattered so
are initial values.
that each small region of observation space can be detected.
We use belief propagation to achieve distributed message
The sensor nodes are also placed to face the center of the
passing. Here, we provide the messages in the factor graph as
observation space. Once they are on the walls, the predicted
shown in Fig. 9(b).
orientations and positions of the sensors are known.
1) For the messages flowing out of variable
nodes Vt and Xt
B. Sensor Selection
Vt ft2 = ft1 Vt = (Vt ) (29) It is important to select the sensors not only to reduce the
Xt ft2 = Xt+1 Xt Xt1 Xt f 3 Xt . (30) amount of data but also to improve the fusion accuracy by
t
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
8 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS
Fig. 11. Illustration of tracking (a) one target case, (b) two targets case, and
(c) three targets case.
Fig. 12. (a) Information gain process for one target. (b) Mutual information
process for one target. (c) Information gain process for two targets. (d) Mutual
information process for two targets.
selecting the most reliable sensors for a certain region at a
certain time. Sensor selection is proposed here to solve such
problem.
Fig. 12(a) shows the information gain with respect to dif-
ferent numbers of sensor nodes for one target. The red curve
is the sensor selection process with the maximum informa-
tion gain at each sensor selection step. The blue curve is the
sensor selection process with the minimum information gain
at each sensor selection step. The green curve is the sensor
selection process with other information gains at each sensor
selection step. Fifty green curves have been generated in our
experiment. It shows that with the maximum information gain
in each sensor selection step, the information gain between
the previous sensor set and the current one is reduced faster.
On the other hand, with the minimum information gain in
each sensor selection step, the information gain between the
previous sensor set and the current one is reduced slower.
It also shows that, for numbers 4, 9, 12, 13, 14, and 15, some
of the information gains from other sensor selection processes
are larger than the one shown in blue curve, marked out as 
in Fig. 12(a). Similar results also show that some of the infor-
mation gains at 4, 6, and 12 are below the red curve, marked
as . These results indicate an boundary assumption. For a
given number m of sensor nodes, let U = (S1 , S2 , . . . , Sm )
be the subset of sensor nodes selected by information gain-
based process, there exists a subset U that holds the
Fig. 13. Illustration of tracking errors with minimum information gain,
maximum information gain, and best sensor selection processes at 4, 6, and
12 sensor nodes.
bound I(X; U) I(X; U ), where U can be an arbitrary subset
that contains m sensor nodes. It is obviously that if we can
do explicit search in each step of sensor selection, it is guar-
anteed that we can select the optimal set of sensor nodes.
However, it is time-consuming and computational complex.
In our approach, our selection relies on previous selections,
which is a conditional process. We can see that, for most of
time the maximum and minimum information gain-based sen-
sor selection processes hold the lower and upper bounds of
sensor selection process, as shown in Fig. 12(a). Thus, our
information-based sensor selection approach is very close to
the optimal solution.
Fig. 12(b) shows the mutual information with respect to
different sensor node numbers for one target. The red curve
here is the sensor selection process with the maximum mutual
information at each sensor selection step. The blue curve here
is the sensor selection process with the minimum mutual infor-
mation at each sensor selection step. The solid line is H(X). It
is the ceiling bound of mutual information I(X; U), where U
includes all the sensor nodes. It shows the similar results
in Fig. 12(a). The more sensor nodes we select, the higher
mutual information between target(s) and sensor nodes we will
get. Fig. 12(c) and (d) shows the information gain and mutual
information with respect to different numbers of sensor nodes
for two targets.
Fig. 13 illustrates the tracking errors with three different
sensor selection processes. They are minimum information
gain process, maximum information gain process and best
selection process. The best selection uses the lowest infor-
mation gain for a given number of sensor nodes. One target
walks along a circle path for this experiment. No calibration
is provided here. For comparison, we use 4, 6, and 12 sensor
nodes with the best selection scheme. It can be seen that max-
imum information gain process in sensor selection provides a
very close performance to best selection. In fact, in Fig. 12,
all the  points are very close to red curve. This result indi-
cates that maximum information gain sensor selection process
can give close to the best performance of tracking. It is also
obvious to see that the more sensors we selected, the better
tracking performance we could get.
C. Subregion Sensor Selection
Subregion sensor selection (see Section IV-C) uses the
locations of targets to narrow down the regions that are
used to calculate information gain or mutual information.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.

LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM 9

Fig. 15. Comparisons of tracking errors and mutual information with respect
to whole-space and subregion sensor selection processes.

Fig. 14. Illustration of Voronoi diagram of (a) subregion sensor selection

for one target, (b) subregion sensor selection for two targets, (c) whole-space
sensor selection I for one target, and (d) whole-space sensor selection II for
one target.

Fig. 16. Illustration of mobile calibration.

Fig. 14(a) and (b) shows the Voronoi space segment plots using
subregion sensor selection method with respect to one target
and two targets cases. It can be seen that, with the target loca-
tion information, we can provide better space segment, which
means smaller segment units. This method focuses on sub-
regions of tracking space to maximize the information gain.
On the other hand, Fig. 14(c) and (d) gives the Voronoi space
segments with whole-space sensor selection method. Fig. 14(c)
provides the same mutual information as in Fig. 14(a). In this
case, the number of segment units is close to the number of
segment units in subregion in Fig. 14(a) while the sizes are
larger. Thus, the tracking error is larger. However, the number Fig. 17. Illustration of mobile calibration draws and sensing probability
of sensor nodes is smaller. Fig. 14(d) illustrates the similar matrices. (a) and (e) Diagonal path case. (b) and (f) Full coverage case.
(c) and (g) Three-path case. (d) and (h) Four-path case.
tracking error as in Fig. 14(a). In this case, the number of
sensor nodes used to achieve such tracking performance is
larger although the mutual information is larger. Fig. 14(b)
give good tracking resolution. From the above result analysis,
shows the Voronoi space segment plot with two targets using
we can see that the advantages of subregion sensor selection
subregion sensor selection method. Similar conclusions to one
method are: 1) with the same mutual information, it gives the
target case (discussed above) can be drawn here, too.
better tracking performance without using many sensor nodes
Fig. 15 gives the comparisons of tracking errors and mutual
and 2) with the same tracking performance, it uses the less
information with respect to whole-space and subregion sen-
number of sensor nodes.
sor selections. One target walks along a circle path. In total,
412 sensor nodes are used to perform tracking. It can be
seen that the mutual information of subregion sensor selection D. Mobile Calibration
process is lower than the mutual information of whole-space. An Android mobile calibration application is developed to
At number of sensor nodes 4 and 8, the mutual information customize the calibration paths and control tracking process
for subregion and whole-space, 4.0219 and 3.8611, is close remotely. As shown in Fig. 16, a subject can preset one path
to each other. However, the tracking error of subregion is in the mobile device by drawing line(s), then click calibration
0.2677 m less than the tracking error of whole-space. Also, the start button and walk along the preset path to do calibration
tracking errors are reduced and close to each other when the for sensors. If more paths are needed for better calibration, one
number of sensor nodes are increased. For the tracking error can draw one path and do calibration one by one. It can be
at around 0.56 m, subregion method selects six sensor nodes done simply with five steps: 1) stop tracking; 2) draw a cali-
while whole-space method selects nine sensor nodes although bration path; 3) start calibration and walk along the calibration
it gives higher mutual information. We also notice that, for path; 4) stop calibration; and 5) start tracking (skip step 1) if
one target case, the number of sensor nodes larger than eight new tracking experiment is conducted.
has small tracking accuracy improvement. So, it is reason- Fig. 17(a)(d) shows the four different customized calibra-
able to select eight sensor nodes in sensor selection process to tion paths drawn for mobile applications. The gridded areas
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
10
Fig. 18. Illustration of calibration errors of the sensor parameters at 6 oclock
using full coverage calibration.
are the tracking space paved by plastic interlocking floor
tiles, as shown in Fig. 16 (right). There are 12 12 grids.
Fig. 17(a) and (b) is one-path calibration draws. However,
Fig. 17(b) covers all the tracking space in order to do cali-
bration. Fig. 17(c) and (d) is the multipath calibration draws.
Compared with Fig. 17(a), (c), and (d) gives more coverage.
Compared with Fig. 17(b), they reduce the calibration time by
only walking along several short paths.
After setting calibration paths, the predicted sensing proba-
bility matrix will be generated with values only related to the
calibration paths. Fig. 17(e)(h) shows the sensing probabil-
ity matrices for the sensor located on the 6 oclock position
with respect to four different calibration paths. During calibra-
tion, the binary readings of each sensor are converted into the
measured sensing probability matrix. By using the calibration
process discussed in Section V, we are able to estimate the
sensing probability matrix, and then calibrate the positions and
orientations of the sensor. The calibrated parameter errors of
the sensor at 6 oclock with full coverage calibration are given
in Fig. 18. The green star is the initial prediction of sensor
parameters. The red star is the calibrated sensor parameters.
Note that the original assumption of this sensors parameters is
( = 90 , x = 3 m, y = 0 m). The calibrated parameters,
( = 4 , x = 0.13 m, y = 0.18 m), mean that the sen-
sor rotates 4 clockwise to 86 , shifts left 0.13 m to 2.87 m
and moves forward 0.180.18 m.
E. One Target Tracking With Calibration
In order to discuss the improvements in tracking perfor-
mance of the four customized calibration paths given above,
the three trajectories (diagonal, circle, and random paths) are
tested for one target case. Here, the number of sensor nodes
to be selected is 8 and the maximum information gain process
with subregion method is used. The three true trajectories are
shown in Fig. 19.
Table I provides the results of tracking errors with dif-
ferent trajectories and calibrations. It can be perceived that
the performance of tracking after calibration is dependent
on the trajectories of the moving subjects. For all three tra-
jectories, the full coverage calibration has the best tracking
performances. For the diagonal trajectory, the diagonal cali-
bration has smaller tracking error than multipath calibrations.
The tracking error, 0.3573 m is close to the lowest track-
ing error 0.3024 m. For the circle trajectory, the four-path
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS
Fig. 19. Illustration of the true trajectories. (a) Diagonal path. (b) Circle
path. (c) Random path.
Fig. 20. Illustration of the random path. (a) True trajectories in X locations.
(b) True trajectories in Y locations. (c) Tracking errors.
calibration gives better tracking performance than diagonal and
three-path calibrations. It is 0.0686 m larger than the full cov-
erage calibration. For the random trajectory, the two multipath
calibrations give close performances, 0.6193 and 0.5598 m.
However, tracking error of the full coverage calibration can
reach 0.3347 m. Furthermore, tracking errors at different times
are given in Fig. 20 for a random trajectory which can be
divided into three short trajectories. We use the diagonal path
for calibration. The average tracking error is 0.5756 m. It is
shown that during the diagonal trajectory, the tracking error
is small while the other two curved trajectories have higher
tracking errors. This result further indicates that if we know
the target trajectory, we can customize the calibration path to
give a better tracking performance unless the full coverage
is used. In fact, in Figs. 13 and 15, without calibration, the
best tracking performance is around 0.55 m for circle trajec-
tory. After using circle path calibration, the tracking error can
be reduced to 0.32 m. Our proposed calibration method can
greatly improve tracking performance in our binary system.
F. Multiple Target Tracking
In this section, we consider the tracking problem of multi-
ple subjects who interact with each other over a period of
time. The number of targets is known a priori. Thus, we
do not consider track initialization and termination here. We
consider the three-target scenario case. The results are shown
in Fig. 21. A full coverage calibration is used with all sensor
nodes selected. It can be seen that although we have used 16
sensor nodes and full coverage calibration, the tracking reso-
lution is not very high but acceptable. In the given time slots,
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM
TABLE I
T RACKING E RRORS A MONG D IFFERENT T RAJECTORIES AND D IFFERENT C ALIBRATION PATHS
Fig. 21. Three-target tracking scenario with 16 sensors and full coverage
calibration. (a) X locations of three paths with time. (b) Y locations of three
paths with time. (c) True trajectories. (d) Estimated trajectories.
circled in Fig. 21(c) and (d), the three targets are very close
to each other. The tracking errors during these time periods
are higher.
The message passing algorithm relies on the number of mes-
sages passed in different times. If we increase the sampling
rate of sensing, more messages will be passed in the network
11
Fig. 22. Illustration of tracking resolutions with sampling rates. (a) 11 Hz.
(b) 17 Hz.
and the tracking resolution will be better. Fig. 22 illustrates
the tracking resolutions with different sampling rates for three-
target scenario. At sampling rate 11 Hz, the average tracking
error is 0.6861 m. When the sampling rate increases to 17 Hz,
the average tracking error is reduced to 0.4706 m. However,
the computational complexity of the message-passing algo-
rithm would be exponentially increased. Fig. 23 shows the
relationship between running time and sampling rate for three-
target scenario given above. As we can see, the running time
of our message passing algorithm is getting longer when the
sampling rate is increasing. Running time > 1 s will cause
delay in tracking. Longer delay (> 2 s) is not acceptable.
Thus, we set the sampling rate to be less than or equal
to 17 Hz.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
12
Fig. 23. Relationship between running time and sampling rate for three-target
scenario by using message passing algorithm.
VIII. C ONCLUSION
In this paper, we have presented a multiple human track-
ing system with sensor selection and calibration based on
distributed binary PIR sensors. The information-based sensor
selection process has been developed to select the best subset
of sensor nodes. This procedure provided suboptimal upper
and lower bounds for mutual information between targets and
sensor nodes. Target locations were also used in sensor selec-
tion to perform the subregion sensor selection. The sensing
probability model was introduced in calibration. A matrix
factorization method was used to update the sensing proba-
bility model. And the calculation of sensor parameters from
the updated probability model was also provided. Distributed
message passing framework was discussed with a factor graph
model for target tracking. The experiment results demon-
strated the good tracking performance after sensor selection
and calibration.
The advantages of binary PIR sensor system in tracking
include flexibility, scalability, robustness, and inexpensiveness.
Such sensing system can be used in smart indoor tracking
applications. Our proposed system has demonstrated satisfac-
tory tracking results with sensor selection and calibration. The
resolution of tracking can reach 0.35 m. In the future, we will
further improve the accuracy from the following two aspects.
1) Improve the design of the binary compressive measure-
ment matrix. The encoded space can be redesigned to
reduce the number of repeated binary codes. We will
also design the binary codes (e.g., LDPC) to maximize
coding efficiency and minimize the number of sensors.
2) Develop a better approach for measurement decoding.
In distributed multiple target tracking scenarios, sen-
sor readings need to be decoded into binary codes.
A decoding optimization approach is needed to have low
decoding error.
R EFERENCES
[1] H. T. Cheng and W. Zhuang, Bluetooth-enabled in-home patient mon-
itoring system: Early detection of Alzheimers disease, IEEE Trans.
Wireless Commun., vol. 17, no. 1, pp. 7479, Feb. 2010.
[2] A. Colombo, D. Fontanelli, D. Macii, and L. Palopoli, Flexible indoor
localization and tracking based on a wearable platform and sensor
data fusion, IEEE Trans. Instrum. Meas., vol. 63, no. 4, pp. 864876,
Apr. 2014.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS
[3] J. He, Y. Geng, and K. Pahlavan, Toward accurate human tracking:
Modeling time-of-arrival for wireless wearable sensors in multipath envi-
ronment, IEEE Sensors J., vol. 14, no. 11, pp. 39964006, Nov. 2014.
[4] K.-C. Lan and W.-Y. Shih, Using smart-phones and floor plans for
indoor location tracking, IEEE Trans. Human-Mach. Syst., vol. 44,
no. 2, pp. 211221, Apr. 2014.
[5] Q. Hao, F. Hu, and J. Lu, Distributed multiple human tracking with
wireless binary pyroelectric infrared (PIR) sensor networks, in Proc.
IEEE Sensors, Kona, HI, USA, Nov. 2010, pp. 946950.
[6] J. Lu, J. Gong, Q. Hao, and F. Hu, Space encoding based compressive
multiple human tracking with distributed binary pyroelectric infrared
sensor networks, in Proc. IEEE Conf. Multisensor Fusion Integr. Intell.
Syst., Hamburg, Germany, Sep. 2012, pp. 180185.
[7] Y. Bar-Shalom and T. E. Fortmann, Tracking and Data Association.
Boston, MA, USA: Academic, 1987.
[8] R. Ma and Q. Hao, Buffons needle model based walker recogni-
tion with distributed binary sensor networks, in Proc. IEEE Conf.
Multisensor Fusion Integr. Intell. Syst., Hamburg, Germany, Sep. 2012,
pp. 120125.
[9] J. Lu, J. Gong, Q. Hao, and F. Hu, Multi-agent based wireless
pyroelectric infrared sensor networks for multihuman tracking and
self-calibration, in Proc. IEEE Conf. Sensors, Baltimore, MD, USA,
Nov. 2013, pp. 14.
[10] Q. Sun, F. Hu, and Q. Hao, Mobile target scenario recognition via low-
cost pyroelectric sensing system: Toward a context-enhanced accurate
identification, IEEE Trans. Syst., Man, Cybern., Syst., vol. 44, no. 3,
pp. 375384, Mar. 2013.
[11] Q. Sun, Z. Wu, J. Lu, F. Hu, and K. Bao, Low-cost pyroelectric sen-
sor networks for Bayesian crowded scene analysis, in Proc. IEEE Int.
Conf. Mobile Ad-hoc Sensor Netw. (MSN), Maui, HI, USA, Dec. 2014,
pp. 8895.
[12] S. B. Crary and Y. Jeong, Bayesian optimal design of experiments
for sensor calibration, in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Solid-State Sensors
Actuators Eurosensors IX. Transducers, vol. 2. Stockholm, Sweden,
Jun. 1995, pp. 4851.
[13] C. Giraud and B. Jouvencel, Sensor selection: A geometrical approach,
in Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Intell. Robots Syst., vol. 2. Pittsburgh, PA, USA,
Aug. 1995, pp. 555560.
[14] R. Garnett, M. A. Osborne, and S. J. Roberts, Bayesian optimization
for sensor set selection, in Proc. 9th ACM/IEEE Int. Conf. Inf. Process.
Sensor Netw., Stockholm, Sweden, 2010, pp. 209219.
[15] K. Ni and G. Pottie, Bayesian selection of nonfaulty sensors, in Proc.
IEEE Int. Symp. Inf. Theory, Nice, France, Jun. 2007, pp. 616620.
[16] F. Zhao, J. Shin, and J. Reich, Information-driven dynamic sensor
collaboration, IEEE Signal Process. Mag., vol. 19, no. 2, pp. 6172,
Mar. 2002.
[17] H. Wang, K. Yao, and D. Estrin, Information-theoretic approaches for
sensor selection and placement in sensor networks for target localiza-
tion and tracking, IEEE J. Commun. Netw., vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 438449,
Dec. 2005.
[18] X. Shen and P. K. Varshney, Sensor selection based on generalized
information gain for target tracking in large sensor networks, IEEE
Trans. Signal Process., vol. 62, no. 2, pp. 363375, Jan. 2014.
[19] D. Bajovic, B. Sinopoli, and J. Xavier, Sensor selection for event detec-
tion in wireless sensor networks, IEEE Trans. Signal Process., vol. 59,
no. 10, pp. 49384953, Oct. 2011.
[20] Y. Zhang and Q. Ji, Efficient sensor selection for active information
fusion, IEEE Trans. Syst., Man, Cybern. B, Cybern., vol. 40, no. 3,
pp. 719728, Jun. 2010.
[21] J. Feng, S. Megerian, and M. Potkonjak, Model-based calibration for
sensor networks, in Proc. IEEE Sensors, vol. 2. Toronto, ON, Canada,
2003, pp. 737742.
[22] J. Feng, G. Qu, and M. Potkonjak, Actuator-based infield sensor
calibration, IEEE Sensors J., vol. 6, no. 6, pp. 15711579, Dec. 2006.
[23] F. Koushanfar, M. Potkonjak, and A. Sangiovanni-Vincentelli, Error
models for light sensors by statistical analysis of raw sensor measure-
ments, in Proc. IEEE Sensors, Vienna, Austria, 2004, pp. 14721475.
[24] K. Whitehouse and D. Culler, Calibration as parameter estimation in
sensor networks, in Proc. ACM Int. Workshop Wireless Sensor Netw.
Appl., Atlanta, GA, USA, 2002, pp. 5967.
[25] L. Balzano and R. Nowak, Blind calibration of sensor networks,
in Proc. 6th Int. Conf. Inf. Process. Sensor Netw., Cambridge, MA,
USA, 2007, pp. 7988.
[26] S. Bolognani, S. Del Favero, L. Schenato, and D. Varagnolo,
Consensus-based distributed sensor calibration and least-square param-
eter identification in WSNS, Int. J. Robust Nonlin. Control, vol. 20,
no. 2, pp. 176193, 2010.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
LU et al.: PREPROCESSING DESIGN IN PIR SENSOR-BASED HUMAN-TRACKING SYSTEM
[27] N. Wiberg, Codes and decoding on general graphs, Ph.D. dissertation,
Dept. Electr. Eng., Linkping Univ., Linkping, Sweden, 1996.
[28] N. Wiberg, H.-A. Loeliger, and R. Kotter, Codes and iterative decoding
on general graphs, Eur. Trans. Telecommun., vol. 6, no. 5, pp. 513525,
1995.
[29] R. M. Tanner, A recursive approach to low complexity codes, IEEE
Trans. Inf. Theory, vol. 27, no. 5, pp. 533547, Sep. 1981.
[30] R. G. Gallager, Low-density parity-check codes, IEEE IRE Trans. Inf.
Theory, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 2128, Jan. 1962.
[31] V. Indelman, S. Williams, M. Kaess, and F. Dellaert, Factor graph based
incremental smoothing in inertial navigation systems, in Proc. IEEE Int.
Conf. Inf. Fusion (FUSION), Singapore, 2012, pp. 21542161.
[32] H. Wang, J. Sun, S. T. Lu, and S. Wei, Factor graph aided multiple
hypothesis tracking, Sci. China Inf. Sci., vol. 56, no. 10, pp. 16, 2013.
[33] V. P. Panakkal and R. Velmurugan, Effective data association scheme
for tracking closely moving targets using factor graphs, in Proc. IEEE
Nat. Conf. Commun. (NCC), Bengaluru, India, Jan. 2011, pp. 15.
Jiang Lu (M15) received the B.Sc. degree from
Shanghai Maritime University, Shanghai, China, in
2008, the M.Sc. degree from the University of
Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA, in 2007, and the
Ph.D. degree from the University of Alabama,
Tuscaloosa, AL, USA, in 2015, all in electrical and
computer engineering.
He is currently an Assistant Professor with the
Department of Computer Engineering, University
of Houston at Clear Lake, Houston, TX, USA.
His research interests include intelligent sensor sys-
tems, biomedical devices, tele-healthcare, wireless communication, distributed
information processing, machine learning, and embedded system designs.
Ting Zhang received the B.E. degree in com-
puter engineering from Tianjing University, Tianjing,
China, in 2008, and the M.S. degree in computer sci-
ence from the University of Texas at Brownsville,
Brownsville, TX, USA, in 2011. She is currently
pursuing the Ph.D. degree in electrical and com-
puter engineering with the University of Alabama,
Tuscaloosa, AL, USA.
Her research interests include data mining
and classification algorithms, computer vision and
computer graphics, tele-healthcare, and mobile
computing.
13
Fei Hu received the Ph.D. degree in signal pro-
cessing from Tongji University, Shanghai, China,
in 1999, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical and
computer engineering from Clarkson University,
Potsdam, NY, USA, in 2002.
He is currently a Professor with the Department
of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University
of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, USA. His research
interests include security: this is about how to over-
come different cyber attacks in a complex wireless
or wired network. Recently he focuses on cyber-
physical system security and medical security issues, signals: this mainly
refers to intelligent signal processing, that is, using machine learning algo-
rithms to process sensing signals in a smart way in order to extract patterns,
and sensors: this includes micro-sensor design and wireless sensor networking
issues.
Qi Hao received the B.E. and M.E. degrees from
Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China, in
1994 and 1997, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree
from Duke University, Durham, NC, USA, in 2006,
all in electrical engineering.
His postdoctoral training with the Center for
Visualization and Virtual Environment, University
of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA, was focused on
3-D computer vision for human tracking and identi-
fication. From 2007 to 2014, he was an Assistant
Professor with the Department of Electrical and
Computer Engineering, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, USA. He
is currently an Associate Professor with the South University of Science
and Technology of China, Shenzhen, China. His research interests include
smart sensors, intelligent wireless sensor networks, and distributed information
processing.