Wireless Sensor Networks – An Introductory Course

Exam
Student’s Name: Diego Stocchero
Student’s Number: 00260844

1) Cite at least 2 differences between WSN and Conventional Computer Networks.

WSN are mainly composed of sensor nodes powered by batteries instead of being pluged to a
continuous source of power, adding energy constraints as one of the key differenting factors
when comparing to a conventional computer network, which does not concern itself with
energy spending for individual computers, only for large servers.
Another major difference is the autonomy and adaptability required for sensor nodes, which
generally are not able to receive continuous communication and need to organize themselves
and perform their tasks with little help from command center, which requires them to be self-
reliable.

2) What is a multimodal WSN? And a Hybrid WSN? Cite an example of each.

A multimodal WSN is a network composed by different types of sensor nodes, whose

capabilities vary in terms of processing, communication and sensing. An example for this sort
of network would be monitoring health systems, which use different types of sensors to
monitor different body parts.
A hybrid WSN refers to networks in which the sensor nodes’ sensing capabilities are similar,
but are different in regards to mobility, having both static and mobile sensors. An example
would be security monitoring in a large event like the Olympics, which employ static cameras
and drones to monitor the area of interest.

3) Cite at least 2 of the main WSN caracteristics.

Data Summary: generally, each individual data sample is not important for applications, but
the mean values over a determined timespan are valuable to understanding situation regarding
the object being sensed.
Mobility: the lack of wires allows the sensors to be mobile and perform tasks impossible for
conventional computers, but they also allow for unintentional mobility, since the not fixed
node can be moved by changes in the environment.

4) Which are the essential and optional componentes of the WSN nodes?

Essential: CPU, code and data memories, sensor device, transceptor and energy source.
Optional: actuators, memory controller, localization unit and energy generator.

5) What are the main goals of the 6LoWPAN?

Provide support to IoT applications, focusing on interoperability and enabiling the use of
IP addressing.
 6) What are the main functionalities of the WSN?

Deployment, when nodes self-organize and dicsover their neighbors; maintenance, maintain
network operational, extending life time and using fault tolerance; sensing, collects data to be
processed; processing, performs data correlation and summarization, and also support tasks
regarding the network itself; communication, essential for operating a WSN, can be single-
hop, multi-hop and MIMO.

7) What is “Duty-Cycling” and what is its role in the WSN energy resources
management?

Duty-Cycling is using an alternating cycle of active and dormant states of sensor nodes,
setting a fraction of one period to active sensing, while the rest of the time energy is saved in
dormant state. Its use is widespread in WSN for energy resources management, since most
sensor nodes use batteries, this method extends the operational lifetime of the node.

8) Cite an example of WSN usage.

Precision agriculture, where mobile and static sensors can be used to collect data regarding
crop’s health, presence of pests, soil properties and solar incidence.

9) Cite two research areas in WSN.

Research in communication protocols, exploring new network properties to improve certain

applications.
Research data in distributed processing algorithms regarding IoT.

10) What is the relation among the concepts of WSN, IoT and Smart Cities?

These three concepts are deeply related, and one can be said to be the evolution of the other:
IoT is based on appending sensing, processing and communicating capabilities to everyday
house objects like fridges, microwaves, light and sound systems etc, using WSN to improve
coordination and data sharing between SmartObjects; while Smart Cities employ the same
concept of IoT to a much larger scale, encompassing traffic, public transport, weather
conditions and many other applications.