Automatic Reliability Assessment of Data Paths in Component-Integrated Sensor Networks

The integration of sensor networks (SNs) into large-scale structural components enables the monitoring of opera-tional loads and resulting structural responses area-wide for the whole part. During the development phase of these components, Finite Element Models (FE-Models) of operational loads can be used to find suitable sensor positions and network configurations for this task. Since the network components can't be replaced after manufacturing due to the integration inside the part, the assessment of the SNs system reliability is important. Because finding a network configuration which fulfills the reliability requirements can be a time-consuming task, an automatic reliability as-sessment for a sensor network aids during the development. In this paper, an algorithmic solution for the automatic calculation of the system reliability is presented. The calculation is based on an analyzation of the data paths and the creation of a reliability block diagram (RBD). In order to show the applicability of this algorithm, it is tested on exemplary scenarios in a case study.

Keywords: Sensor network, Data paths, System reliability, Reliability block diagram.

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