Over the past decade, there has been a prolific increase in the research, development and commercialisation of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) and their associated technologies (see Figure 1). This rise has been a result of a number of contributing factors, including continued miniaturisation (leading towards an era of truly ‘pervasive’ and ‘invisible’ computing); low-power circuits, devices and computation (for example, the ultra-low-power sleep states now found in microcontrollers); and efficient short-range communication (such as ZigBee and Bluetooth). The dramatic rise in WSN activity, fuelled by the prospect of a new computing paradigm, has resulted in the topic being researched (and taught) in the electronics and computer science departments.
