WASP: Wireless autonomous sensor prototype for Visual Sensor Networks

Visual Sensor Networks (VSNs) enable enhanced three-dimensional sensing of spaces and objects, and facilitate collaborative reasoning to open up a new realm of vision-based distributed smart applications including security/surveillance, healthcare delivery, traffic monitoring, just to name a few. However, such applications require sensor nodes that can efficiently process large volumes of visual information in-situ and exhibit intelligent behavior to support autonomous operation, scalability, and energy efficiency. This paper presents WASP, a vision sensor node prototype with high computational capabilities that satisfy key VSN application requirements. The node integrates hardware components comprising a generic processor, a wireless communication module, and a camera, with a software framework designed to carry out key visual information processing tasks including object detection, segmentation, and morphological operators for image enhancement. In addition, the framework implements classifiers for target recognition and scenario analysis.