Network coding solution for improving transmission reliability in wireless sensor networks employed in industrial monitoring

One of the most appropriate techniques to increase the reliability of wireless sensor networks used in industrial environments are the network coding techniques. This paper proposes an effective, yet simple and scalable approach based on a relay-assisted cooperative scheme that uses Reed Solomon codes as network codes for such wireless sensor networks with cluster-tree topologies. The global Block Error Rate performances of this approach are analyzed in three different scenarios, characterized by different Block Error Rate distributions of the component paths. The results obtained show that this solution significantly improves the performances even for great coding rates. The paper also proposes an optimization of the network code functionality, based on a genetic algorithm, and concludes that it is effective in improving the performances for high coding rates.