2011/02/16 by Chenda Liao, Liao, Chenda, Harshavardhan Chenji +7
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Mathematics · #DNA and Biological Computing #Diffusion and Search Dynamics #FOS: Computer and information sciences #FOS: Electrical engineering #Limits and Structures in Graph Theory #Robotics (cs.RO) #Systems and Control (eess.SY) #electronic engineering #information engineering
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1102.3396
openalex publication_date 2011/02/16 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
In this paper we consider the problem of monitoring detecting separation of agents from a base station in robotic and sensor networks. Such separation can be caused by mobility and/or failure of the agents. While separation/cut detection may be performed by passing messages between a node and the base in static networks, such a solution is impractical for networks with high mobility, since routes are constantly changing. We propose a distributed algorithm to detect separation from the base station. The algorithm consists of an averaging scheme in which every node updates a scalar state by communicating with its current neighbors. We prove that if a node is permanently disconnected from the base station, its state converges to 0. If a node is connected to the base station in an average sense, even if not connected in any instant, then we show that the expected value of its state converges to a positive number. Therefore, a node can detect if it has been separated from the base station by monitoring its state. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated through simulations, a real system implementation and experiments involving both static as well as mobile networks.