Integrated Modeling and Simulation Framework for Wireless Sensor Networks

Existing ad hoc system design methods for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) suffer from lack of reusability. In addition, the interactions between the continuous-time physical environments and WSNs have not been well studied. In this paper, we propose a model-based systems design (MBSD) framework for WSNs, which is a systematic methodology applying systems engineering principles to enhance model reusability and collaborations among multiple modeling domains. Firstly, we describe a hierarchy of model libraries to model various behaviors and structures of WSNs, including physical environments, physical platforms, communication and computation components, system services and applications. Based on the MBSD framework, we introduce a system design flow to compose both continuoustime and event-triggered modules to develop applications with support for performance study by simulations. Next, we briefly describe the main modules for physical platforms, the Media Access Control (MAC) layer, wireless channels and physical environments, which are developed using the Systems Modeling Language (SysML), Simulink and Modelica. Finally, we use a building thermal control system as the case study to demonstrate the composability, reusability and flexibility of the proposed MBSD framework.