A Feasible Localization Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks Using Directional Antenna

Recent years, directional antenna has been extensively used in designing protocols for wireless sensor networks. It provides many advantages over classical omni-directional antenna, such as increased spatial reuse ratio and reduced energy consumption. In wireless sensor networks, location estimation is necessary for sensor nodes to provide meaningful information about their surrounding environment. Numerous localization schemes using anchor nodes equipped with low gain omni-directional antenna have been proposed. Since the omni-directional antenna radiate energy in all directions, wanted signal is easily interfered with wide range of environment noise, leading to big localization error. In contrast, a directional antenna concentrates its energy in a particular direction. The reduction in interference of surrounding sensor nodes increases localization accuracy. In this paper, we tackle the problems in estimating location of randomly deployed sensor nodes with a low gain omni-directional antenna. We propose a novel localization scheme using a mobile anchor node equipped with a directional antenna. Our localization scheme is verified by OPNET simulation software. The result shows that the proposed localization algorithm has higher accuracy and energy efficiency than other localization schemes.