Ad-hoc Wireless Routing for Wildlife Tracking with Environmental Power Constraint

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to suggest an algorithm by which mica motes can organize themselves into a network to relay packets as quickly as possible under energy constraints from environmental harvesting. This problem is part of a larger project to develop a means to monitor red wolves using a mica mote network. The network has three parts: sensor motes attached to collars on the wolves, a base station or base stations that receive packets and display them in useable form for scientists and relay motes that forward packets from the sensor motes to a base station. The proposed algorithm adapts Hohlt et al's Flexible Power Scheduling to work under Kansal et al's Environmental Harvesting power constraint. Employing this strategy changes energy consumption from a performance objective to a constraint, allowing me to add my own throughput maximizing piece to the algorithm, based on dynamic programming and microeconomics. I also discuss the ongoing development of a simulation of this algorithm, designed to test its performance and to solve implementation problems.