A survey on fault tolerance techniques in Wireless Sensor Networks

Fault tolerance is one of the critical issues in Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) applications. The problem of missing sensor node, communication link and data are inevitable in wireless sensor networks. WSNs experience failure problems due to various factors such as power depletion, environmental impact, radio interference, asymmetric communication links, dislocation of sensor node and collision. Many researchers have proposed fault tolerant mechanisms that are able to achieve higher data reliability, accuracy, energy saving, enhance network lifetime and minimize failure of components of wireless sensor network. This paper presents a critical analysis of various fault tolerance mechanisms in wireless sensor networks such as redundancy based mechanisms, clustering based mechanisms and deployment based mechanisms to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each one of these mechanisms. Finally, the paper presents conclusion and suggests some future research directions that will be helpful for researchers who are working in this field.