Wireless Sensor Networks: From Fundamentals and Applications to Innovations and Future Trends

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) have transformed data acquisition and processing across diverse domains such as environmental monitoring, healthcare, and industrial automation. Recent advancements in areas such as federated intelligence, blockchain-based trust mechanisms, and quantum sensing are reshaping the landscape of WSNs. Yet, their full implications for next-generation applications demand deeper exploration. This survey is driven by the need to synthesize these emerging directions through a forward-looking and interdisciplinary lens, highlighting their transformative potential in evolving WSNs into intelligent, autonomous systems. It examines key solutions in energy harvesting, adaptive communication, and edge intelligence, which address persistent constraints like limited energy availability, dynamic topologies, and scalability. Moreover, it highlights the integration of WSNs with disruptive technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and digital twins, enabling intelligent, autonomous systems capable of real-time analytics. Critical energy optimization, security, and data management challenges are explored alongside cutting-edge solutions like federated learning (FL), quantum sensing, and blockchain-based trust mechanisms. Future research directions emphasize bio-inspired architectures, hybrid communication in extreme environments, and efficient multi-modal data fusion. This survey serves as a foundational reference for researchers and practitioners seeking to design resilient, intelligent WSN-based systems for the next generation of applications.