Current model and Doppler effect based time synchronization algorithm

Clock synchronization technology is the fundamental problem of wireless sensor networks and a necessary condition for underwater sensor network nodes to collaboratively work. Transmission fading of radio in underwater environment is extremely large, so it often uses acoustic to transmit data in underwater wireless sensor networks. Due to high latency caused by low sound speed in the underwater acoustic environment, it is difficult to apply mature radio time synchronization algorithms to underwater environments. In recent years, several time synchronization algorithms for underwater sensor networks have been developed. However, most of these algorithms require large energy for data exchange and for complex linear regression calculations. When taking the mobile platform as the time reference node, the time synchronization between nodes will lead to the problem of bidirectional delay inequality. In order to solve these problems, we design a low consumption time synchronization algorithm based on ocean current model and Doppler effect for UWSNs. It can estimate the propagation delay by detecting the received acoustic frequency variation to achieve time synchronization correction. MATLAB simulations show that, compared with existing clock synchronization protocols, our algorithm not only degrades energy consumption, but also behaves high precision.