Sensor Networks Continue to Puzzle: Selected Open Problems

While several important problems in the field of sensor networks have already been tackled, there is still a wide range of challenging, open problems that merit further attention. We present five theoretical problems that we believe to be essential to understanding sensor networks. The goal of this work is both to summarize the current state of research and, by calling attention to these fundamental problems, to spark interest in the networking community to attend to these and related problems in sensor networks.

[1]  Richard M. Karp,et al.  Reducibility Among Combinatorial Problems , 1972, 50 Years of Integer Programming.

[2]  Robin Milner,et al.  On Observing Nondeterminism and Concurrency , 1980, ICALP.

[3]  T. Ibaraki,et al.  The Computational Complexity of the m -Center Problems on the Plane , 1981 .

[4]  Sam Toueg,et al.  Optimal clock synchronization , 1985, PODC '85.

[5]  Michael Luby,et al.  A simple parallel algorithm for the maximal independent set problem , 1985, STOC '85.

[6]  Charles J. Colbourn,et al.  Unit disk graphs , 1991, Discret. Math..

[7]  Noga Alon,et al.  A Lower Bound for Radio Broadcast , 1991, J. Comput. Syst. Sci..

[8]  Nathan Linial,et al.  Locality in Distributed Graph Algorithms , 1992, SIAM J. Comput..

[9]  Harry B. Hunt,et al.  Simple heuristics for unit disk graphs , 1995, Networks.

[10]  Richard M. Karp,et al.  On parallel evaluation of game trees , 1998, JACM.

[11]  U. Feige.  A threshold of ln n for approximating set cover , 1998, JACM.

[12]  Santosh S. Vempala.  Random projection: a new approach to VLSI layout , 1998, Proceedings 39th Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (Cat. No.98CB36280).

[13]  David G. Kirkpatrick,et al.  Unit disk graph recognition is NP-hard , 1998, Comput. Geom..

[14]  Ravi Prakash,et al.  Unidirectional links prove costly in wireless ad hoc networks , 1999, DIALM '99.

[15]  Ivan Stojmenovic,et al.  Routing with Guaranteed Delivery in Ad Hoc Wireless Networks , 1999, DIALM '99.

[16]  Panganamala Ramana Kumar,et al.  RHEINISCH-WESTFÄLISCHE TECHNISCHE HOCHSCHULE AACHEN , 2001 .

[17]  Li Li,et al.  Distributed topology control for power efficient operation in multihop wireless ad hoc networks , 2001, Proceedings IEEE INFOCOM 2001. Conference on Computer Communications. Twentieth Annual Joint Conference of the IEEE Computer and Communications Society (Cat. No.01CH37213).

[18]  Mani B. Srivastava,et al.  Dynamic fine-grained localization in Ad-Hoc networks of sensors , 2001, MobiCom '01.

[19]  Xiang-Yang Li,et al.  Minimum-energy broadcast routing in static ad hoc wireless networks , 2001, Proceedings IEEE INFOCOM 2001. Conference on Computer Communications. Twentieth Annual Joint Conference of the IEEE Computer and Communications Society (Cat. No.01CH37213).

[20]  Lujun Jia,et al.  An efficient distributed algorithm for constructing small dominating sets , 2002, Distributed Computing.

[21]  Erik D. Demaine,et al.  Anchor-Free Distributed Localization in Sensor Networks , 2003 .

[22]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Constant-time distributed dominating set approximation , 2003, PODC '03.

[23]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Worst-Case optimal and average-case efficient geometric ad-hoc routing , 2003, MobiHoc '03.

[24]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Convergence to Equilibrium in Local Interaction Games , 2008, 2009 50th Annual IEEE Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science.

[25]  James Aspnes,et al.  On the Computational Complexity of Sensor Network Localization , 2004, ALGOSENSORS.

[26]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Does topology control reduce interference? , 2004, MobiHoc '04.

[27]  Craig Gotsman,et al.  Distributed Graph Layout for Sensor Networks , 2004, Graph Drawing.

[28]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Unit disk graph approximation , 2004, DIALM-POMC '04.

[29]  Nancy A. Lynch,et al.  Clock Synchronization for Wireless Networks , 2004, OPODIS.

[30]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Fast Deterministic Distributed Maximal Independent Set Computation on Growth-Bounded Graphs , 2005, DISC.

[31]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Local approximation schemes for ad hoc and sensor networks , 2005, DIALM-POMC '05.

[32]  Stefan Schmid,et al.  A robust interference model for wireless ad-hoc networks , 2005, 19th IEEE International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium.

[33]  Paolo Santi.  Topology control in wireless ad hoc and sensor networks , 2005 .

[34]  R. Wattenhofer,et al.  Interference arises at the receiver , 2005, 2005 International Conference on Wireless Networks, Communications and Mobile Computing.

[35]  Nancy A. Lynch,et al.  Gradient clock synchronization , 2004, PODC '04.

[36]  Tomas Johansson,et al.  Reducing interference in ad hoc networks through topology control , 2005, DIALM-POMC '05.

[37]  Xiang-Yang Li,et al.  A unified energy-efficient topology for unicast and broadcast , 2005, MobiCom '05.

[38]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  On the locality of bounded growth , 2005, PODC '05.

[39]  Johann Hurink,et al.  A PTAS for the Minimum Dominating Set Problem in Unit Disk Graphs , 2005, WAOA.

[40]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Minimizing interference in ad hoc and sensor networks , 2005, DIALM-POMC '05.

[41]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Theoretical aspects of connectivity-based multi-hop positioning , 2005, Theor. Comput. Sci..

[42]  Xiang-Yang Li,et al.  Low-Interference Topology Control for Wireless Ad Hoc Networks , 2005, Ad Hoc Sens. Wirel. Networks.

[43]  Christoph Ambühl,et al.  An Optimal Bound for the MST Algorithm to Compute Energy Efficient Broadcast Trees in Wireless Networks , 2005, ICALP.

[44]  Alexander Wolff,et al.  Constructing interference-minimal networks , 2005, EuroCG.

[45]  Wojciech Rytter,et al.  Broadcasting algorithms in radio networks with unknown topology , 2006, J. Algorithms.

[46]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Topology control meets SINR: the scheduling complexity of arbitrary topologies , 2006, MobiHoc '06.

[47]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Oblivious Gradient Clock Synchronization , 2006, DISC.

[48]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  The price of being near-sighted , 2006, SODA '06.

[49]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  The Complexity of Connectivity in Wireless Networks , 2006, Proceedings IEEE INFOCOM 2006. 25TH IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications.

[50]  Thomas Erlebach,et al.  Constant-Factor Approximation for Minimum-Weight (Connected) Dominating Sets in Unit Disk Graphs , 2006, APPROX-RANDOM.

[51]  Sriram V. Pemmaraju,et al.  Local approximation schemes for topology control , 2006, PODC '06.

[52]  Takeshi Tokuyama,et al.  Minimizing Interference of a Wireless Ad-Hoc Network in a Plane , 2006, ALGOSENSORS.

[53]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  How Optimal are Wireless Scheduling Protocols? , 2007, IEEE INFOCOM 2007 - 26th IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications.

[54]  David Peleg,et al.  Time-Efficient Broadcasting in Radio Networks: A Review , 2007, ICDCIT.

[55]  Roger Wattenhofer,et al.  Complexity in geometric SINR , 2007, MobiHoc '07.

[56]  Aravind Srinivasan,et al.  Cross-layer latency minimization in wireless networks with SINR constraints , 2007, MobiHoc '07.

[57]  Beat Gfeller,et al.  A randomized distributed algorithm for the maximal independent set problem in growth-bounded graphs , 2007, PODC '07.

[58]  T. Moscibroda,et al.  The Worst-Case Capacity of Wireless Sensor Networks , 2007, 2007 6th International Symposium on Information Processing in Sensor Networks.

[59]  Imran A. Pirwani,et al.  Good Quality Virtual Realization of Unit Ball Graphs , 2007, ESA.

[60]  Alexander Wolff,et al.  Constructing minimum-interference networks , 2008, Comput. Geom..

[61]  David G. Kirkpatrick,et al.  On routing with guaranteed delivery in three-dimensional ad hoc wireless networks , 2008, Wirel. Networks.

[62]  Jie Gao,et al.  Localization and routing in sensor networks by local angle information , 2009, TOSN.