In-motes: an intelligent agent based middleware for wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have been identified as a promising technology that will allow people and machines to interact with their environment in a revolutionary way. These networks, however, are facing limitations such as energy constraints of the sensor and difficulties in reprogramming the actual network. To address these limitations we propose a novel agent middleware. Namely In-Motes can be considered as an intelligent network which is deployed with no pre-installed application. Mobile agents are injected into the network, then migrate and clone across it, following specific rules and performing application specific tasks. By doing so, each mote is given a certain degree of perception, cognition and control, forming the basis of its intelligence. Linda-like tuplespaces and federated system architecture are proposed as the means for collaboration and coordination of the agents. In order to make the network more robust, certain behavioural rules are proposed taking inspiration from a community of bacterial strains. These preserve each agent's certain degree of autonomy and identifies a highly coordinated architecture for them.