EcoPlex: Empowering compact wireless sensor platforms via roaming and interoperability support

EcoPlex is an infrastructure that enables simple wireless platforms to participate seamlessly in a feature-rich, wireless ad hoc network. EcoPlex consists of gateways that are responsible for handoff support for mobility and high data rate without burdening the simple nodes to implement multi-hop protocols. The gateways also create virtual identities for simpler nodes to enable their participation in the feature-rich network without adding complexity to them. We demonstrate the feasibility of this idea with the ultra-compact wireless sensor platform called Eco to participate as virtual nodes in a fully general ZigBee network. Experimental results show EcoPlex to be efficient and scalable. The enhanced mobility and interoperability are added to the Eco platform at the infrastructure level, all with minimal node complexity.