Sensor networks are dense wireless networks of small, low-cost sensors, which collect and disseminate en-vironmental data. Wireless sensor networks facilitate monitoring and controlling of physical environments from remote locations with better accuracy. They have applications in a variety of fields such as environ-mental monitoring; military purposes and gathering sensing information in inhospitable locations. Sensor nodes have various energy and computational constraints because of their inexpensive nature and adhoc method of deployment. Considerable research has been focused at overcoming these deficiencies through more energy efficient routing, localization algorithms and system design. Our survey presents the funda-mentals of wireless sensor network, thus providing the necessary background required for understanding the organization, functionality and limitations of those networks. The middleware solution is also investigated through a critical presentation and analysis of some of the most well established approaches.
D. Culler, D. Estrin, and M. Srivastava, “Overview of sensor networks,” IEEE Computer, pp. 41–49, 2004.
J. Hill, R. Szewczyk, A. Woo, S. Hollar, and D. Culler, “Sys-tem architecture directions for networked sensors,” Architec-tural Support for Programming Languages and Operating Sys-tems, pp. 93–104, 2000.
A. Boulis, C. C. Han, and M. B. Srivastava, “Design and im-plementation of a framework for efficient and programmable sensor networks,” International Conference On Mobile Systems, Applications And Services, pp. 187–200, 2003.
Cisco Systems, “Network management systems organization,” 2000, http://www.ddirv.lv/doc_upl/sazonovs1.pdf.
W. Stallings, “Wireless communications and networks,” ISBN-10: 0131918354, pp. 45–50, 2004.
D. Culler, D. Estrin, and M. Srivastava, “Overview of sensor networks,” IEEE Computer, pp. 41–49, 2004.
I. F. Akyildiz, Y. Sankarasubramaniam, W. Su, and E. Cayirci, “Wireless sensor networks: a survey,” Computer Networks, pp. 393–422, 2002.
W. L. Lee, A. Datta, and R. Cardell-Oliver, “WinMS: Wireless sensor network-management system,” CSSE Technical Report, UWA-CSSE-06-001, 2006.
I. F. Akyildiz, Y. Sankarasubramaniam, W. Su, and E. Cayirci, “Wireless sensor networks: a survey,” Computer Networks, pp. 393–422, 2002.
L. B. Ruiz and J. M. Nogueira, “MANNA: Management archi-tecture for wireless sensor networks,” Communications Maga-zine, Vol. 41, No. 2, pp. 116–125, 2003.
H. Song, D. Kim, K. Lee, and J. Sung, “UPnP-based sensor network management architecture,” Proceedings of the second International Conference on Mobile Computing and Ubiquitous Networking, pp. 85–92, 2005.
W. Heinzelman, A. Chandrakasan, and H. Balakrishan, “En-ergy efficient communication protocol for wireless microsen-sors networks,” Proceedings of the Hawaii International Con-ference on System Science, pp. 10–17, 2000.
Y. Xu, “Geography-informed energy conservation for ad hoc routing,” Mobicom’01, pp. 203–212, 2001.
W. L. Lee, A. Datta, and R. Cardell-Oliver, “WinMS: Wire-less sensor network-management system,” CSSE Technical Report, UWA- CSSE-06-001, 2006.
N. Ramanathan, K. Chang, R. Kapur, L. Girod, and E. Kohler, “Sympathy for the sensor network debugger,” Centre for Em-bedded Network Sensing, pp. 98, 2005.
S. Madden, J. Hellerstein, and W. Hong, “TinyDB: In-network query processing in TinyOS,” ACM Transactions on Database Systems, pp. 122–173, 2003.
R. Tynan, D. Marsh, D. O'Kane, and G. M. P. O'Hare, “Intelli-gent agents for wireless sensor networks,” AAMAS 2005: 1179–1180.
T. H. Kim and S. Hong, “Sensor network management protocol for state-driven execution environment,” Pro-ceedings of the International Conference on Ubiquitous Computing, pp. 197–199, 2003.
J. Wan, S. Eisenman, A. Campbell, and J. Crowcroft, “Siphon: overload traffic management using multi-radio virtual sinks in sensor networks,” Proceedings of the 3rd International Confer-ence on Embedded Networked Sensor Systems, pp. 116–129, 2005.
Zhang, “Network management in wireless sensor networks,” 2001. http://www.csse.uwa.edu.au/~winnie/Network_Managem- ent _in_WSNs_.pdf.
P. Levis and D. Culler, “Mate: A tiny virtual machine for sen-sor networks,” Proceedings of the International Conference on Architectural Support for Programming Languages and Oper-ating Systems, San Jose, CA, USA, pp. 100–111, 2002.
C. L. Fok and G. C. Roman, “Mobile agent middleware for sensor networks: An application case study,” Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Information Processing in Sensor Networks, pp. 382–387, 2005.
S. Eduardo, G. Germano, and V. Glauco, “A message-oriented middleware for sensor networks,” Proceedings of the 2nd workshop on Middleware for pervasive and ad-hoc computing, pp. 127–134, 2004.
D. Georgoulas and K. Blow, “In-Motes: An intelligent agent based middleware for wireless sensor networks,” Best Student Paper Award, Proceedings of the 5th WSEAS International Conference SEPADS 06, pp. 225–231, 2006.
Welsh et al, “Wireless medical sensor networks in emergency response: Implementation and pilot results,” IEEE International Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security.
D. Georgoulas and K. Blow, “Making motes intelligent: An agent based approach to wireless sensor networks,” In WSEAS on Communications Journal, pp. 515–522, 2006.
D. Georgoulas and K. Blow, “In-Motes bins: A real time ap-plication for environmental monitoring in wireless sensor net-works,” Proceedings of the 9th IEEE/IFIP International Con-ference on Mobile and Wireless Communications Networks, pp. 21–26, 2007.
D. Georgoulas and K. Blow, “Intelligent mobile agent middle-ware for wireless sensor networks: A real time application case study,” AICT 2008, in Proceedings of 4th Advanced Interna-tional Conference on Telecommunications: Programmable networks, active networks and mobile agents, protocol & stan-dards, Athens, pp. 35–43, 2008.