Distributed Deployment Algorithms for Efficient Coverage in a Network of Mobile Sensors With Nonidentical Sensing Capabilities

In this paper, efficient deployment algorithms are proposed for a mobile sensor network to improve the coverage area. The proposed algorithms find the target position of each sensor iteratively, based on the existing coverage holes in the network. The multiplicatively weighted Voronoi (MW-Voronoi) diagram is used to discover the coverage holes corresponding to different sensors with different sensing ranges. Three sensor deployment algorithms are provided, which tend to either move sensors out of densely packed areas or place them in proper positions with respect to the boundaries of the MW-Voronoi regions. Under the proposed procedures, the sensors move in such a way that the coverage holes in the target field are reduced. Simulations confirm the effectiveness of the deployment algorithms proposed in this paper.