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Virginia Tech

SUNSHINE: A Multi-Domain Sensor Network Simulator

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

Simulators are important tools for analyzing and evaluating different design options for wireless sensor networks (sensornets) and hence, have been intensively studied in the past decades. However, existing simulators only support evaluations of protocols and software aspects of sensornet design. They cannot accurately capture the significant impacts of various hardware designs on sensornet performance. As a result, the performance/energy benefits of customized hardware designs are difficult to be evaluated in sensornet research. To fill in this technical void, in this thesis, we describe the design and implementation of SUNSHINE, a scalable hardware-software cross-domain simulator for sensornet applications. SUNSHINE is the first sensornet simulator that effectively supports joint evaluation and design of sensor hardware and software performance in a networked context. SUNSHINE captures the performance of network protocols, software and hardware up to cycle-level accuracy through its seamless integration of three existing sensornet simulators: a network simulator TOSSIM, an instruction-set simulator SimulAVR and a hardware simulator GEZEL. SUNSHINE solves challenging design problems, including data exchanges and time synchronizations across different simulation domains and simulation accuracy levels. SUNSHINE also provides hardware specification scheme for simulating flexible and customized hardware designs. Several experiments are given to illustrate SUNSHINE's cross-domain simulation capability, demonstrating that SUNSHINE is an efficient tool for software-hardware codesign in sensornet research.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Master of Science
Level thesis:degree_level
masters
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Department dc:contributor.department
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2010

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Zhang, Jingyao
Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
  • Yang, Yaling
Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Yao, Danfeng (Daphne)
  • Hou, Yiwei Thomas

Subjects

dc:subject × 4

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright
Language dc:language.iso
en

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
etd-10112010-141518
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/45146

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Zhang, Jingyao. SUNSHINE: A Multi-Domain Sensor Network Simulator. masters thesis, Virginia Tech, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/45146