Reliability and availability evaluation of Wireless Sensor Networks for industrial applications

Area of Science:

• Industrial Computing
• Network Engineering
• Reliability Engineering

Background:

• Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) are crucial for industrial process control and monitoring.
• High dependability (reliability and availability) is essential due to potential economic, safety, and environmental consequences of system failure.
• Permanent faults in WSN devices pose significant risks, impacting communication and control algorithms.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a structured methodology for evaluating the reliability and availability of WSNs.
• To address the lack of systematic approaches for assessing permanent faults in WSN devices.
• To enable system designers to optimize decisions for minimizing WSN failures.

Main Methods:

• Development of a methodology for automatic fault tree generation.
• Evaluation of WSN reliability and availability under permanent device faults.
• Support for diverse network topologies, redundancy levels, and reconfiguration scenarios.

Main Results:

• A novel approach for assessing WSN dependability against permanent faults.
• The methodology accommodates various network complexities and failure conditions.
• Enables quantitative evaluation of reliability and availability.

Conclusions:

• The proposed fault tree generation methodology effectively evaluates WSN dependability.
• It provides a valuable tool for the design and validation of reliable industrial WSNs.
• Optimizing WSN reliability and availability is achievable through this structured approach.