Bounding the Lifetime of Target Tracking Sensor Networks

We propose a novel model to formally define the lifetime of target tracking sensor network based on energy by considering the relationship between individual sensors and the whole sensor network, the importance of different sensors based on their roles in delay constrained routing. The model is valuable for two reasons. First, it exposes the dependence of lifetime on factors like hop bound, network density, radio transmission range, sensing range and target behavior within the region. This allows us to see what factors have the most impact on lifetime and consequently where engineering effort is best expended. Secondly, the model implies the best routing strategy. In this paper, we also suggest a simple routing algorithm to achieve the bound.