How different trajectories of moving beacons influence the localization of nodes in disaster scenarios using wireless communication

There are two main issues which are currently under research in the localization field when mobile beacons (aka anchors or reference nodes) are used. The first issue represents a strategy to select the most efficient reference information from redundant data collected during the reconnaissance process. The second issue is a static path planning problem which represents an anchor placement approach. The latter will be the focus of this work. This paper explores a disaster scenario and considers an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that moves around buildings and localizes “survived” devices inside a building. This can help to detect victims and to accelerate the rescue process. For this, fast and accurate localization is essential. In this paper, we compare five trajectories in terms of localization precision and required time. A modified Joint Clustering method is being used for the selection of anchors from the list of redundant reference information. A multilateration algorithm from our previous work is being utilized to calculate positions of nodes. Consequently, simulations are presented with an appropriate signal propagation model for the considered disaster scenario.