Poster: Delay Tolerant Networking for Sensor Networks

Sensor network deployments may be far removed from communications infrastructure such as the Internet. Yet, to be maximally useful, these networks of sensors must ultimately be connected to data storage and analysis facilities. Providing connectivity for such networks may involve exotic and unusual methods of data transfer. In addition, within such networks, problems of intermittent connectivity due to power scheduling, node failure, and packet losses from unpredictable external factors are frequently encountered. As a solution the first problem, we propose the use of the Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN) architecture, which provides reliable data communication across heterogeneous, failure-prone networks. For the second problem, we show elements of the DTN architecture can be employed within a sensor network to mitigate communication interruptions. We suggest an overall architecture, employing the full DTN architecture for access to sensor networks, combined with a subset implementation of its design for use within sensor networks, as a reasonable basis for a complete delay-tolerant sensor network architecture.