Distributed event region fault-tolerance based on weighted distance for wireless sensor networks

Event region detection is the important application for wireless sensor networks (WSNs), where the existing faulty sensors would lead to drastic deterioration of network quality of service. Considering single-moment nodes fault-tolerance, a novel distributed fault-tolerant detection algorithm named distributed fault-tolerance based on weighted distance (DFWD) is proposed, which exploits the spatial correlation among sensor nodes and their redundant information. In sensor networks, neighborhood sensor nodes will be endowed with different relative weights respectively according to the distances between them and the central node. Having syncretized the weighted information of dual-neighborhood nodes appropriately, it is reasonable to decide the ultimate status of the central sensor node. Simultaneously, readings of faulty sensors would be corrected during this process. Simulation results demonstrate that the DFWD has a higher fault detection accuracy compared with other algorithms, and when the sensor fault probability is 10%, the DFWD can still correct more than 91% faulty sensor nodes, which significantly improves the performance of the whole sensor network.