Testbed and Research Platforms

The design validation and evaluation of sensor network applications and communication protocols are difficult tasks due to their distributed nature. Although reasonable simulation tools exist for evaluating large-scale sensor networks, we still prefer a real sensor network testbed to understand resource limitations, communication loss, and energy constraints at scale. Our research work aims to provide permanent testbeds for the testing of sensor network applications by facilitating research in sensor network programming environments, communication protocols, system design and applications.

ICT has built other resources to support sophisticated research works, including an EDA Design Platform and a Super Scientific Computing Platform.

EDA Design Platform	Super Scientific Computing Platform

Approach

We intend to provide a reliable backchannel for sensor nodes which can makes remote reprogramming and monitoring of permanently-powered sensor network nodes possible. Users can submit their jobs through the web-based user interface and instrument the nodes to send the debugging message with the backchannel which is either Ethernet or USB-hub. The architecture of test-bed should be of high scalability and flexibility for deployment. Compared with the existing large scale testbeds, we are working on a novel architecture and hardware to address these challenges.

Systems/Experiments

We tried to build an indoor testbed on the ceilings of each floor in our buildings. The main difficulties we met in the construction include the signal shielding effect, the deployment constrains and space limits. The tentative experiments will keep running until we find reasonable safety precautions.

Accomplishments

Dong Li, Ze Zhao and Li Cui, "EasiTB (Draft) : A Scalable and feasible Wireless Sensor Network Test-bed ", Technical Report, WSN-ICT-CAS, 2008.5

Future Directions

In future, we plan to build large scale mobile sensor network testbed. The large outdoor test-bed is also in considerations.