An Energy Consumption Aware Solution for the 3D Localization and Synchronization Problems in WSNs

Localization and synchronization are fundamental services for many applications in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), since it is often required to know the sensor nodes´ position and global time to relate a given event detection to a specific location and time. However, the localization and synchronization tasks are often performed after the sensor nodes´ deployment in the sensor field. Since manual configuration of sensor nodes is usually an impractical activity, it is necessary to rely on specific algorithms to solve both the problems of localizing and synchronizing the clock of sensor nodes. With this in mind, in this work we propose a joint solution for the problem of 3D localization and time synchronization in WSNs using an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). A UAV equipped with a GPS flies over the sensor field area broadcasting its geographical position. Therefore, sensor nodes are able to estimate their geographical position and global time without the need to equip them with a GPS device. By means of simulations we show that our proposed join solution leads to smaller time synchronization and localization errors as well as a lower energy consumption when compared to solutions found in the literature.