The goal of real-time deployment is the
rapid establishment
of a wireless mesh network to support communications in hard-to-reach
areas. Intended applications are
primarily emergency response communications in areas where traditional
wireless
solutions are problematic: inside large
buildings, underground tunnels and mines, and urban canyons. Beyond
two-way communications, ancillary
services may include location tracking of emergency responders,
environmental
sensing, and physiological sensing of responders. In a typical scenario, a first responder (FR) equipped with a two-way radio and several small relay nodes enters a building. As the FR goes further into the building, the radio signal from incident command (IC) weakens. Before losing radio connectivity with IC, a relay node is deployed, providing two-hop connectivity between the FR and IC. This process repeats whenever any FR is about to lose radio signal, creating a multi-hop mesh network in real time to maintain connectivity with IC. NIST work on real-time deployment of mesh networks is focused in three areas:
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Linear positioner used to induce
time-varying channel
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Plots of SNR and Packet Success
Rate versus time
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NIST has
developed two prototypes demonstrating
real-time deployment of a multihop wireless network between a fixed
incident command
station and a mobile user:
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