Dynamic Coverage of Mobile Sensor Networks

Abstract

We study the dynamic aspects of the coverage of a mobile sensor network resulting from continuous movement of sensors. As sensors move around, initially uncovered locations may be covered at a later time, and intruders that might never be detected in a stationary sensor network can now be detected by moving sensors. However, this improvement in coverage is achieved at the cost that a location is covered only part of the time, alternating between covered and not covered. We characterize area coverage at specific time instants and during time intervals, as well as the time durations that a location is covered and uncovered. We further consider the time it takes to detect a randomly located intruder and prove that the detection time is exponentially distributed with parameter 2lambda r bar{v}_s where lambda represents the sensor density, r represents the sensor's sensing range, and bar{v}_s denotes the average sensor speed. For mobile intruders, we take a game theoretic approach and derive optimal mobility strategies for both sensors and intruders. We prove that the optimal sensor strategy is to choose their directions uniformly at random between [0, 2pi ). The optimal intruder strategy is to remain stationary. This solution represents a mixed strategy which is a Nash equilibrium of the zero-sum game between mobile sensors and intruders.