A Novel Network Topology in Underwater Visible Light Sensor Networks

Visible light communication systems have gained prominence as a method for underwater communications. In this paper, we investigate a novel underwater visible light network mechanism that utilises a honeycomb-like topology that we call ´spider-web´, and algorithms to perform reliable, energy efficient communication for underwater visible light sensor networks. The spider-web topology idea is inspired by the way a spider hunts using its own web. Spiders use catching silk, probably in some form of a simple sheet web, to capture their prey. When a spider makes its own web, it makes radial lines of the web first, and then makes the circular threads around the web until the whole web is finished. We use this idea to build our network topology and routing in underwater visible light sensor networks. The sinks are similar to a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), and can have mobile capability and access data from network. The presented approach is validated and evaluated in a simulated environment using the GTNetS simulator. To verify the proposed algorithm, we are currently developing the proposed scheme on OMNeT++ network simulator in multiple scenarios, in order to efficiently collect data in our simulation environment.