Reliable node placement in wireless sensor networks using cellular automata

Wireless sensor networks are often used to provide critical measurements in unattended harsh environments. They should be designed to adequately monitor their surroundings while being resilient to environmental changes. Appropriate sensor node placement greatly influences their capability to perform this task. Cellular automata have properties very similar to those of wireless sensor networks. In this paper, we present a sensor node placement algorithm that runs on a cellular automaton and achieves adequate coverage, connectivity and sparsity while being resilient to changing environmental conditions.