Node localisation in wireless ad hoc networks

Abstract

Wireless ad hoc networks often require a method for estimating their nodes' locations. Typically this is achieved by the use of pair-wise measurements between nodes and their neighbours, where a number of nodes already accurately know their location and the remaining nodes must calculate theirs using these known locations. Typically, a minimum mean square estimate (MMSE), or a maximum likelihood estimate (MLE) is used to generate the unknown node locations, making use of range estimates derived from measurements between the nodes. In this paper we investigate the efficacy of using radio frequency, received signal strength (RSS) measurements for the accurate location of the transmitting nodes over long ranges. We show with signal strength measurements from three or more wireless probes in noisy propagation conditions, that by using a weighted MMSE approach we can obtain significant improvements in the variance of the location estimate over both the standard MMSE and MLE approaches.