Base Station Design and Architecture for Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract

Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) systems are an invaluable tool in agriculture. Currently these systems are good at reporting and logging data, though newly available WSN systems also provide features to control irrigation and other environmental parameters. The crux of this work is making the data useable and actionable for the grower as well as the framework behind it. A stable framework is necessary for the system to gain acceptance among growers, and to guarantee long term use. A secure framework is also needed for WSN based irrigation control and for remotely accessible user interfaces. This paper describes a WSN base station implementation that is deployed at over a dozen agricultural sites examining all key components including the base software, base to node communications, user interfaces, and data storage. After discussing the base station design the user interface that has evolved with constant feedback from growers and researchers will be presented. This system is a fully featured base station that enables growers and researchers to maximize the benefit from their WSN system.