SMTS: a swarm intelligence-inspired sensor wake-up control method for multi-target sensing in wireless sensor networks

The different number of targets in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) leads to different detection effects. Because of the existence of multiple targets in the detection area, excessive nodes wake up to detect each target in most cases. This process will consume too much energy and lead to the early failure of the network. We propose an algorithm named sensor wake-up control method for multi-target sensing (SMTS) inspired by swarm intelligence. In SMTS, we first construct the stochastic switching model based on a sliding window mechanism to distinguish single-target or multi-target scenarios. We further research wake-up strategy optimization for dynamic targets to solve the problem associated with excessively awakened nodes. The simulations demonstrate that SMTS significantly reduces the number of wake-up nodes around the intersections of multiple targets, effectively saves energy, and prolongs the service lifetime of WSNs while ensuring detection efficiency and accuracy.