Mohammed Abdullah Alnuem

A Review of IEEE 802.15.6 MAC, PHY, and Security Specifications

IEEE 802.15.6 is the first international Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN) standard that supports communications in the vicinity of or inside a human body to serve a variety of medical and nonmedical applications. The standard defines a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer that supports several Physical (PHY) layers. In this paper, the key features of the IEEE 802.15.6 standard are presented. The MAC, PHY, and security specifications of the standard are explained in detail. Different communication modes and access mechanisms are presented. The Narrowband (NB), Ultra-wideband (UWB), and Human Body Communications (HBC) specifications are reviewed in terms of frame structure, modulation, and other important parameters. Finally, the security paradigm and services of the standard are highlighted.

Localized Algorithm for Segregation of Critical/Non-critical Nodes in Mobile Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks

Abstract Timely segregation of connectivity-centric critical/non-critical nodes is extremely crucial in mobile ad hoc and sensor networks to assess network vulnerabilities against critical node failures and provide precautionary means for survivability. This paper presents a localized algorithm for segregation of critical/ n on-critical n odes (LASCNN) that opts to distinguish critical/non-critical nodes to the network connectivity based on limited topology information. Each node establishes and maintains a k-hop connection list and employ LASCNN to determine whether it is critical/non- critical. Based on the list, LASCNN marks a node as critical if its k-hop neighbors become disconnected without the node, non-critical otherwise. Simulation experiments demonstrate the scalability of LASCNN and shows the performance is quite competitive compared to a scheme with global network information. The accuracy of LASCNN in determining critical nodes is 87% (1-hop) and 93% (2-hop) and non-critical nodes 91% (1-hop) and 93% (2-hop).

Formal Specification and Validation of a Localized Algorithm for Segregation of Critical/Noncritical Nodes in MAHSNs

Timely segregation of critical/noncritical nodes is extremely crucial in mobile ad hoc and sensor networks. Most of the existing segregation schemes are centralized and require maintaining network wide information, which may not be feasible in large-scale dynamic networks. Moreover, these schemes lack rigorous validation and entirely rely on simulations. We present a localized algorithm for segregation of critical/noncritical nodes (LASCNN) to the network connectivity. LASCNN establishes and maintains a k-hop connection list and marks a node as critical if its k-hop neighbours become disconnected without the node and noncritical otherwise. A noncritical node with more than one connection is marked as intermediate and leaf noncritical otherwise. We use both formal and nonformal techniques for verification and validation of functional and nonfunctional properties. First, we model MAHSN as a dynamic graph and transform LASCNN to equivalent formal specification using Z notation. After analysing and validating the specification through Z eves tool, we simulate LASCNN specification to quantitatively demonstrate its efficiency. Simulation experiments demonstrate that the performance of LASCNN is scalable and is quite competitive compared to centralized scheme with global information. The accuracy of LASCNN in determining critical nodes is 87% (1-hop) and 93% (2-hop) and of noncritical nodes the accuracy is 91% (1-hop) and 93% (2-hop).

A Hybrid and Secure Priority-Guaranteed MAC Protocol for Wireless Body Area Network

This paper introduces a hybrid and secure MAC protocol (PMAC) for WBAN. The PMAC protocol uses two contention access periods (CAPs) for accommodating normal and life-critical traffic and one contention-free period (CFP) for accommodating large amount of data packets. The priority-guaranteed CSMA/CA procedure is used in the CAP period, where different priorities are assigned to WBAN nodes by adjusting the backoff window size. In addition, a set of security keys is used to prevent illegal access to the network. Analytical expressions are derived to analyze the average delay, power consumption, throughput, and packet loss probability of the PMAC protocol. Results derived from these expressions are validated by computer simulations.

Resource efficient connectivity restoration algorithm for mobile sensor/actor networks

Maintaining inter-node connectivity is of a paramount concern in most applications of mobile sensor/actor networks because nodes have to report their data and coordinate their operations. Failure of a node may partition the inter-node network into disjoint segments, and may thus hinder data delivery and inter-node coordination. This article presents a novel resource efficient connectivity restoration algorithm (RECRA) that opts to repair severed connectivity while imposing minimal overhead on the nodes. To avoid overreacting to non-critical failure, RECRA identifies critical/non-critical nodes and only triggers the recovery when a critical node fails. The failure of a node is detected by its neighbors and a recovery procedure is executed based on their proximity, status (critical/non-critical), and transmission range. RECRA prefers to employ a non-critical node and moves it to the place of failed node in order to limit the impact on coverage, scope of the recovery, and strangle successive cascaded relocations. In case non-critical nodes in the neighborhood are not available, the neighbors restore connectivity by exploiting their partially utilized transmission power and repositioning closer to the failed node. RECRA is validated analytically and through extensive simulations. The simulation results confirm the effectiveness of RECRA for both dense and sparse network segments and its performance advantage over contemporary schemes found in the literature.

A Survey of Home Energy Management for Residential Customers

The state of the art of old-age grids into smart grids provides residents the opportunity to schedule their appliances to consume the energy optimally that leads to potentially balance the demand side as well as the supply side more effectively and minimizes the power Peak-to-Average Ratio (PAR), which ultimately provides benefit to the residents in the form of reduction cost and expense. The Energy Management System (EMS) in the home receives the market and system signals and controls the loads, Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning systems (HVAC), storages and local generation units according to the user preferences. This survey encompasses novel home energy management techniques including different shift able and non-shift able load scheduling methods and peak shaving strategies. Several Pricing strategies have been suggested for smart grid such as, Real-Time Pricing (RTP), Time of Use (ToU), Inclining Block Rates (IBR), Critical Peak Pricing (CPP), etc. Moreover, this paper discusses the HEM architecture and reveals that the different energy management techniques intelligently schedule the appliances in order to satisfy the maximum residents comfort level and consume the energy optimally.

A novel wireless sensor and actor network framework for autonomous monitoring and maintenance of lifeline infrastructures

This position paper introduces a novel wireless sensor and actor network (WSAN) framework for autonomous monitoring and maintenance of pipe and power line (oil, gas, water, electricity) infrastructures in an efficient and cost-effective manner. The main focus is on boosting the availability of lifeline infrastructures through advancements in the WSAN technology. First, we categorize and classify the existing lifeline monitoring systems. Second, we identify the requirements for effective and efficient monitoring and maintenance of lifeline infrastructures. Third, we propose a novel WSAN architecture that combines sensing with distributed decision-making and acting capabilities through advanced robotics. Two operational models for the proposed architecture are also presented. The first is a push-up model that employs low-cost, multi-functional sensors along the lifeline to observe certain phenomena of interest, e.g., leakage, ruptures, clogs, etc., in real time and reports to actors over wireless links. The actors process the received data, coordinate with each other in order to identify the most appropriate response. The second is a pull-down model that capitalizes the resources of elite nodes (i.e. actors) in the network.

Depth-Based Energy-Balanced Hybrid Routing Protocol for Underwater WSNs

Underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) are meant to be deployed at the areas that need to be monitored continuously without the human assistance. Therefore, these networks are expected to stay operational for a longer period of time. However, sensor nodes in these networks are equipped with limited energy (e.g., battery) resources. Moreover, uneven energy consumption is one of the biggest challenges in UWSN because it leads to creation of energy holes and ultimately shorten network lifetime. This invites UWSN designers to introduce protocols that can minimize and balance energy consumption of nodes. This paper presents DB-EBH, a Depth-Based Energy-Balanced Hybrid routing protocol for UWSNs. Like EBH, DB-EBH is a hybrid approach which is based on direct and multihop communication. However, DB-EBH considers linear random deployment of nodes. It selects a priority neighbor node for data forwarding on the basis of its depth from the sink. Simulation results validate the performance of DB-EBH in terms of energy efficiency, network lifetime and throughput.

Design of an energy-efficient and reliable data delivery mechanism for mobile ad hoc networks: a cross-layer approach

In a mobile ad hoc network, the data packet may fail to be delivered for various reasons mostly for route failure, congestion, and battery energy drain. Hence, providing reliable and timely data delivery in this network in an energy‐efficient way is challenging. Although there exist several solutions to solve these problems, they can handle either route failure or congestion or energy‐efficient routing. Hence, to cope up with all the problems simultaneously, we propose a route failure and congestion‐aware energy‐efficient cross‐layer design that spans the transport and network layer. In the transport layer, we introduce the concept of local packet buffering during link failure and congestion. As a result, the packet dropping rate of the network and energy consumption decreases. In the network layer, a routing protocol is proposed for selecting the energy‐efficient path for data transmission. It uses the buffering mechanism in case of route maintenance. In addition, we employ a multilevel congestion detection and control mechanism at the source and intermediate nodes that can judiciously take the most appropriate decision for congestion control in the network proactively. The simulation results showed that the proposed cross‐layer design provided better performance as compared with the state‐of‐the‐art protocols. Copyright

iA-MAC: Improved Adaptive Medium Access Control protocol for Wireless Body Area Networks

This paper presents improved Adaptive Medium Access Control (iA-MAC) protocol for Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs). In addition to the adaptive guard band assignment technique, the newly proposed protocol has an improved as well as adaptive sleep/wakeup mechanism. We consider a simple temperature measuring application, where sensors (nodes) sense human body for updated information. If the current readings are within normal range, nodes stay in idle state (do not access channel). On the other hand, if the current sensed information is within high range then nodes switch to active state and access the channel because critical information needs to be transmitted as soon as possible. Besides the normal and high ranges of temperature, if the current sensed temperature lies with pre-high range then nodes access for channel if and only if the current sensed data is not duplicated version of the previously sensed data. Moreover, iA-MAC uses well defined synchronization mechanism to avoid collisions between data as well as control packets. Simulation results show that performance of the newly proposed iA-MAC protocol is better than its existing counter part protocols in terms of the selected performance metrics.