Wireless sensor network-based infrastructure damage detection constrained by energy consumption

Structural health monitoring, which is the process of assessing the health of instrumented structures, is becoming increasingly important as much of the world's infrastructure ages and deteriorates. Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have the potential to deliver continuous, highly accurate structural health monitoring at a low cost. In this paper, we present a novel WSN system that monitors ambient vibrations at various locations on a structure and looks for deviations from the structure's baseline response to determine if any sections are potentially experiencing damage. In contrast to earlier methods, our system does not require engineering knowledge of the structure on which it is deployed. We also introduce a theoretical framework to attain the system's desired lifetime, which is demonstrated experimentally by determining the amount of energy that our algorithm consumes when running on Zolertia Z1 sensor nodes. Finally, in this context, we introduce a novel circuit that reduces current flow for inactive nodes by 99.97% compared to their minimum sleep current, thus extending their lifetime.