WSN-Based Smart Landslide Monitoring Device

In this article, we present a smart monitoring wireless sensor networking (WSN) node device, referred to as “SMARTMODE. ” The indigenously developed SMARTMODE is energy-efficient, context-adaptive, reliable, and accurate. We have custom-designed it to monitor landslide movement and causative parameters and to ensure the system’s longevity, reliability, and robustness in harsh environmental conditions. When in sleep mode, the SMARTMODE is designed in such a way that it consumes less power (i.e., 0.034 mA at 4.2 V) while is still able to detect minor slope variations. This is achieved by enabling low-power interrupt-based sensing in the SMARTMODE. The SMARTMODE is also capable of automatically varying its data acquisition frequency based on the severity of the environmental context, thereby making it context-adaptive. Furthermore, we designed the SMARTMODE in such a way that it can detect and filter faults such as noise and outliers in the acquired sensor’s data. In addition, to enhance the reliability, SMARTMODE comprises energy harvesting and backup approach to deal with power outage issues. This approach enables automatic recharging of SMARTMODE’s battery even during nighttime to ensure reliable and continuous landslide monitoring. Finally, we evaluated the performance of the proposed SMARTMODE by deploying it in an actual landslide location.