ABSTRACT
Deploying nodes by plane or a mobile vehicle can be an adequate alternative, instead of a precise placement of each sensor node in a well-defined infrastructure. However, this implies a random distribution process, due to for instance uncontrollable natural influences like wind or flight direction of the plane. The localization requires information about the interrelation between a node and its environment. This information may comprise knowledge about neighboring nodes, connectivity metrics, positions of reference nodes, the gradient and rotation of the node, and other data. This section gives an overview about both positioning systems and localization algorithms in wireless sensor networks. The global positioning system has been a popular localization system used by military as well as civil applications. The resource–aware localization can only be achieved by carefully analyzing its behavior on all network layers. The strong limitations in sensor networks, an efficient localization method requires small communication overhead and energy–aware algorithms to meet the conditions.
