High-performance target tracking scheme with low prediction precision requirement in WSNs

Tracking mobile target is one of the most important applications in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) for surveillance system. Researchers heavily believe that: selecting proactive nodes in the region where the target may arrive in the next moment can obtain good performances in terms of energy efficiency, tracking probability and tracking precision. However, it is a great challenge that how to predict the movement of a mobile target accurately. This paper proposed a high-performance tracking scheme with a low requirement of prediction accuracy (low prediction precision requirement target tracking (LPPT)), which can work with a pre-existing target prediction algorithm. In LPPT scheme, the residual energy is employed to select more proactive nodes in the non-hotspots area, whereas less proactive nodes are selected in the hotspots area. Both theoretical and numerical simulation results show that the proposed scheme significantly improved the probability of target detection and energy efficiency, decreased the detection delay, meanwhile guaranteed the network lifetime.