RF Mapping for Sensor Nodes Connectivity and Communication Signal Recovery

Abstract

The network connectivity is vital for operative and proficient mobile robot team’s maneuvers. In search and rescue scenarios, many obstacles are preventing effective wireless communication. A promising solution to the problem is combining the RF mapping method and the gradient method. The RF mapping endeavors to measure the effects of RF obstacles in the physical environment that may attenuate signals as a transmitter/receiver pair moves through the field. By mapping these attenuation patterns, nodes can avoid known “RF shadows.” The gradient method, based on extracting the components of the multidimensional gradient as the robots move around a source of RF interference to find the locations of strong signal strength (direct line of sight) and weakest signal strength (dead zones). This paper presents a connectivity approach based on the radio frequency (RF) mapping and the robot team’s gradient estimation methods. The physical and simulation results of the experiments promise to achieve reliable network connectivity for mobile nodes.