Coordinated workload scheduling in hierarchical sensor networks for data fusion applications

To minimize the execution time of a sensing task over a multi-hop hierarchical sensor network, we present a coordinated scheduling method following the divisible load scheduling paradigm. The proposed scheduling strategy builds on eliminating transmission collisions and idle gaps between two successive data transmissions. We consider a sensor network consisting of several clusters. In a cluster, after related raw data measured by source nodes are collected at the fusion node, in-network data aggregation is further considered. The scheduling strategies consist of two phases: intra-cluster scheduling and inter-cluster scheduling. Intra-cluster scheduling deals with assigning different fractions of a sensing workload among source nodes in each cluster; inter-cluster scheduling involves the distribution of fused data among all fusion nodes. Closed-form solutions to the problem of task scheduling are derived. Finally, numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the impacts of different system parameters such as the number of sensor nodes, measurement, ommunication, and processing speed, on the finish time and energy consumption.