SenseCode: Network Coding for Reliable Sensor Networks

Designing a communication protocol for sensor networks often involves obtaining the right trade-off between energy efficiency and end-to-end packet error rate. In this article, we show that network coding provides a means to elegantly balance these two goals. We present the design and implementation of SenseCode, a collection protocol for sensor networks—and, to the best of our knowledge, the first such implemented protocol to employ network coding. SenseCode provides a way to gracefully introduce a configurable amount of redundant information into the network, thereby decreasing end-to-end packet error rate in the face of packet loss. We compare SenseCode to the best (to our knowledge) existing alternative and show that it reduces end-to-end packet error rate in highly dynamic environments, while consuming a comparable amount of network resources. We have implemented SenseCode as a TinyOS module and evaluate it through extensive TOSSIM simulations.