Wireless Sensor Network Virtualization: Early Architecture and Research Perspectives

TL;DR

This paper reviews current WSN virtualization approaches, proposes a new four-layer architecture utilizing CoAP, and demonstrates its potential through a prototype sharing a WSN among multiple applications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel four-layer architecture for WSN virtualization that leverages CoAP and demonstrates its feasibility with a prototype implementation.

Findings

Prototype shows effective resource sharing among applications.

Performance measurements validate the architecture's viability.

Highlights future research directions in WSN virtualization.

Abstract

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have become pervasive and are used in many applications and services. Usually the deployments of WSNs are task oriented and domain specific; thereby precluding re-use when other applications and services are contemplated. This inevitably leads to the proliferation of redundant WSN deployments. Virtualization is a technology that can aid in tackling this issue, as it enables the sharing of resources/infrastructure by multiple independent entities. In this paper we critically review the state of the art and propose a novel architecture for WSN virtualization. The proposed architecture has four layers (physical layer, virtual sensor layer, virtual sensor access layer and overlay layer) and relies on the constrained application protocol (CoAP). We illustrate its potential by using it in a scenario where a single WSN is shared by multiple applications; one of which is a fire monitoring application. We present the proof-of-concept prototype we have built along with the performance measurements, and discuss future research directions.