Multi-sensor wireless sensor network nodes for alpine environment monitoring
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Author
Date
2019-10-28Type
- Student Paper
ETH Bibliography
yes
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Abstract
The Pizol Glacier is the first glacier in Switzerland to be declared dead in 2019
and it will not be the last if global warming continues to this extent. Because
glaciers and permafrost are melting, our mountains are becoming more and more
unstable. In the coming years it is expected that dangerous rockfalls will increase
in size and quantity and that they will also occur in previously safe areas. At
the same time, leisure activities such as hiking and mountain biking are becoming
popular and more and more people are living in endangered places.
In order to better anticipate the effects of these changes and to be able to
warn people, it has become very important to understand the movements and
activities of our mountains. Despite recent efforts in deploying low-cost geophone
sensors to accurately track these changes the sensor capabilities are still quite
limited.
To resolve these limitations, we have introduced more geophones and sensors
in the latest version. These new sensors allow us to capture more and new data
and enable new capabilities such as monitoring of slow changes or determining
the exact position. However, the platform is in the middle of development as it
still lacks essential features such as reliable error handling and robust scheduling.
To achieve this, we perform a thorough analysis on the entire code base and
extend the new scheduler, debugging and logging features. To place the platform
even in hard-to-reach locations we have to make sure the communication works
in both directions so that we can remotely change the configurations and the
sensor data are stored in the backend. Through detailed power measurements
and intensive testing of the complete system and all subsystems we verify the
correctness. This way we make the system more robust and fail-safe.
We demonstrate that if the task scheduler is improved as well as extended and
the new sensor data is handled correctly, the new platform will be deployment-
ready and ready for real-world testing in the coming months. Show more
Permanent link
https://doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000375239Publication status
publishedPublisher
ETH ZurichSubject
Environment monitoring; Alpine; Embedded SystemsOrganisational unit
03429 - Thiele, Lothar (emeritus) / Thiele, Lothar (emeritus)
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ETH Bibliography
yes
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