Hyojeong Shin

Y-MAC: An Energy-Efficient Multi-channel MAC Protocol for Dense Wireless Sensor Networks

As the use of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) becomes widespread, node density tends to increase. This poses a new challenge for medium access control (MAC) protocol design. Although traditional MAC protocols achieve low-power operation, they use only a single channel which limits their performance. Several multi-channel MAC protocols for WSNs have been recently proposed. One of the key observations is that these protocols are less energy efficient than single-channel MAC protocols under light traffic conditions. In this paper, we propose an energy efficient multichannel MAC protocol, Y-MAC, for WSNs. Our goal is to achieve both high performance and energy efficiency under diverse traffic conditions. In contrast to most of previous multi-channel MAC protocols for WSNs, we implemented Y-MAC on a real sensor node platform and conducted extensive experiments to evaluate its performance. Experimental results show that Y-MAC is energy efficient and maintains high performance under high-traffic conditions.

Mobility prediction-based smartphone energy optimization for everyday location monitoring

Monitoring a users mobility during daily life is an essential requirement in providing advanced mobile services. While extensive attempts have been made to monitor user mobility, previous work has rarely addressed issues with battery lifetime in real deployment. In this paper, we introduce SmartDC, a mobility prediction-based adaptive duty cycling scheme to provide contextual information about a users mobility: time-resolved places and paths. Unlike previous approaches that focused on minimizing energy consumption for tracking raw coordinates, we propose efficient techniques to maximize the accuracy of monitoring meaningful places with a given energy constraint. SmartDC comprises unsupervised mobility learner, mobility predictor, and Markov decision process-based adaptive duty cycling. SmartDC estimates the regularity of individual mobility and predicts residence time at places to determine efficient sensing schedules. Our experiment results show that SmartDC consumes 81% less energy than the periodic sensing schemes, and 87% less energy than a scheme employing context-aware sensing, yet it still correctly monitors 80% of a users location changes within a 160-second delay.

Unsupervised Construction of an Indoor Floor Plan Using a Smartphone

Indoor pedestrian tracking extends location-based services to indoor environments. Typical indoor positioning systems employ a training/positioning model using Wi-Fi fingerprints. While these approaches have practical results in terms of accuracy and coverage, they require an indoor map, which is typically not available to the average user and involves significant training costs. A practical indoor pedestrian tracking approach should consider the indoor environment without a pretrained database or floor plan. In this paper, we present an indoor pedestrian tracking system, called SmartSLAM, which automatically constructs an indoor floor plan and radio fingerprint map for anonymous buildings using a smartphone. The scheme employs odometry tracing using inertial sensors, an observation model using Wi-Fi signals, and a Bayesian estimation for floor-plan construction. SmartSLAM is a true simultaneous localization and mapping implementation that does not necessitate additional devices, such as laser rangefinders or wheel encoders. We implemented the scheme on off-the-shelf smartphones and evaluated the performance in our university buildings. Despite inherent tracking errors from noisy sensors, SmartSLAM successfully constructed indoor floor plans.

RETOS: resilient, expandable, and threaded operating system for wireless sensor networks

This paper presents the design principles, implementation, and evaluation of the RETOS operating system which is specifically developed for micro sensor nodes. RETOS has four distinct objectives, which are to provide (1) a multithreaded programming interface, (2) system resiliency, (3) kernel extensibility with dynamic reconfiguration, and (4) WSN-oriented network abstraction. RETOS is a multithreaded operating system, hence it provides the commonly used thread model of programming interface to developers. We have used various implementation techniques to optimize the performance and resource usage of multithreading. RETOS also provides software solutions to separate kernel from user applications, and supports their robust execution on MMU-less hardware. The RETOS kernel can be dynamically reconfigured, via loadable kernel framework, so a application- optimized and resource-efficient kernel is constructed. Finally, the networking architecture in RETOS is designed with a layering concept to provide WSN-specific network abstraction. RETOS currently supports Atmel ATmegal28, TI MSP430, and Chipcon CC2430 family of microcontrollers. Several real-world WSN applications are developed for RETOS and the overall evaluation of the systems is described in the paper.

Evaluating mobility models for temporal prediction with high-granularity mobility data

A mobility model is an essential requirement in accurately predicting an individuals future location. While extensive studies have been conducted to predict human mobility, previous work used coarse-grained mobility data with limited ability to capture human movements at a fine-grained level. In this paper, we empirically analyze several mobility models for predicting temporal behavior of an individual user. Unlike previous approaches, which employed coarse-grained mobility data with partial temporal-coverage, we use fine-grained and continuous mobility data for the evaluation of mobility models.We explore the regularity and predictability of human mobility, and evaluate location-dependent and location-independent models with several feature-aided schemes. Our experimental results show that a location-dependent predictor is better than a location-independent predictor for predicting temporal behavior of individual user. The duration of stay at a location is strongly correlated to the arrival time at the current location and the return-tendency to the next location, rather than recent k location sequences.We also find that false-positive predictions can be reduced by adaptive use of mobility models.

Smartphone-based Wi-Fi pedestrian-tracking system tolerating the RSS variance problem

The Wi-Fi fingerprinting (WF) technique normally suffers from the RSS (Received Signal Strength) variance problem caused by environmental changes that are inherent in both the training and localization phases. Several calibration algorithms have been proposed but they only focus on the hardware variance problem. Moreover, smartphones were not evaluated and these are now widely used in WF systems. In this paper, we analyze various aspect of the RSS variance problem when using smartphones for WF: device type, device placement, user direction, and environmental changes over time. To overcome the RSS variance problem, we also propose a smartphone-based, indoor pedestrian-tracking system. The scheme uses the location where the maximum RSS is observed, which is preserved even though RSS varies significantly. We experimentally validate that the proposed system is robust to the RSS variance problem.

SmartDC: Mobility Prediction-Based Adaptive Duty Cycling for Everyday Location Monitoring

Monitoring a users mobility during daily life is an essential requirement in providing advanced mobile services. While extensive attempts have been made to monitor user mobility, previous work has rarely addressed issues with predictions of temporal behavior in real deployment. In this paper, we introduce SmartDC, a mobility prediction-based adaptive duty cycling scheme to provide contextual information about a users mobility: time-resolved places and paths. Unlike previous approaches that focused on minimizing energy consumption for tracking raw coordinates, we propose efficient techniques to maximize the accuracy of monitoring meaningful places with a given energy constraint. SmartDC comprises unsupervised mobility learner, mobility predictor, and Markov decision process-based adaptive duty cycling. SmartDC estimates the regularity of individual mobility and predicts residence time at places to determine efficient sensing schedules. Our experiment results show that SmartDC consumes 81 percent less energy than the periodic sensing schemes, and 87 percent less energy than a scheme employing context-aware sensing, yet it still correctly monitors 90 percent of a users location changes within a 160-second delay.

Smartphone-based Wi-Fi tracking system exploiting the RSS peak to overcome the RSS variance problem

The Wi-Fi fingerprinting (WF) technique normally suffers from the Received Signal Strength (RSS) variance problem caused by environmental changes that are inherent in both the training and localization phases. Several calibration algorithms have been proposed but they only focus on the hardware variance problem. Moreover, smartphones were not evaluated and these are now widely used in WF systems. In this paper, we analyzed various aspects of the RSS variance problem when using smartphones for WF: device type, device placement, user direction, and environmental changes over time. To overcome the RSS variance problem, we also propose a smartphone-based, indoor pedestrian-tracking system. The scheme uses the location where the maximum RSS is observed, which is preserved even though RSS varies significantly. We experimentally validate that the proposed system is tolerant to the RSS variance problem.

Wi-Fi Fingerprint-Based Topological Map Building for Indoor User Tracking

Estimating the geographical position of mobile device such as Smart phone in an indoor environment is not easy without the use of specific infrastructures. In this article, we introduce an indoor user tracking system. The system constructs a topological map with Wi-Fi signal calibrations, assigns semantically meaningful labels into the map, and estimates the semantic location of the user based on the current Wi-Fi observation. The system does not require a geometric map, or costly radio map building process. We implemented the system with the off-the-shelf Smart phone and experimentally validated the scheme.

A lightweight stateful address autoconfiguration for 6LoWPAN

Sensor networks have become increasingly important in various areas, and most current applications require connectivity between sensor networks and the Internet. By being seamlessly integrated into IP network infrastructure, sensor network applications would benefit from standardized and established technology, as well as from the plethora of readily available applications. Preparing sensor networks for IP communication and integrating them into the IP network, however, present new challenges on the architecture and its functional blocks, e.g., the adaptation of the respective link technology for IP support, development of security mechanisms, and autoconfiguration to support ad hoc deployment. In this paper, we focus on the IPv6 address autoconfiguration issue and propose a proxy-based autoconfiguration protocol. The proposed protocol guarantees the assignment of a unique address to each node in the network. The protocol is simulated and implemented on off-the-shelf sensor network platforms. The experiment results show that our mechanism outperforms similar network address configuring mechanisms in terms of latency and overhead.