Performance Evaluation of RSSI Based Distance Measurement for Localization in Wireless Sensor Networks

Research has shown that the awareness of positions of wireless sensor nodes is a desirable feature for many applications in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN). The key in ranging and localization technologies in WSNs is the relationship between the Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) values and distance. The RSSI of radio channels provides a feasible way of estimating the distance between nodes because the use of it does not require any additional hardware but simply a radio transceiver compared to other range based models. In this paper, an RSSI model that estimates the distance between sensor nodes in WSNs is presented. The performance of this model is evaluated and analyzed in a real system deployment in an indoor environment by performing an empirical measurement using Crossbow IRIS wireless sensor motes. It is shown that the results of this evaluation can contribute towards obtaining accurate locations of wireless sensor nodes.