Ultra-Low Power Data Storage for Sensor Networks
Publication Date
2009
Journal or Book Title
ACM TRANSACTIONS ON SENSOR NETWORKS
Abstract
Local storage is required in many sensor network applications, both for archival of detailed event information, as well as to overcome sensor platform memory constraints. While extensive measurement studies have been performed to highlight the trade-off between computation and communication in sensor networks, the role of storage has received little attention. The storage subsystems on currently available sensor platforms have not exploited technology trends, and consequently the energy cost of storage on these platforms is as high as that of communication. Current flash memories, however, offer a low-priced, high-capacity and extremely energy-efficient storage solution. In this paper, we perform a comprehensive evaluation of the active and sleep-mode energy consumption of available flash-based storage options for sensor platforms. Our results demonstrate more than a 100-fold decrease in per-byte energy consumption for surface-mount parallel NAND flash in comparison with the MicaZ on-board serial flash. In addition, this dramatically reduces storage energy costs relative to communication, introducing a new dimension in traditional computation vs communication trade-offs. Our results have significant ramifications on the design of sensor platforms as well as on the energy consumption of sensing applications. We quantify the potential energy gains for two commonly used sensor network services: communication and in-network data aggregation. Our measurements show significant improvements in each service: 50-fold and up to 10-fold reductions in energy for communication and data aggregation respectively.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1109/IPSN.2006.243850
Pages
-
Volume
5
Issue
4
Recommended Citation
Mathur, G; Desnoyers, P; Chukiu, P; Ganesan, D; and Shenoy, P, "Ultra-Low Power Data Storage for Sensor Networks" (2009). ACM TRANSACTIONS ON SENSOR NETWORKS. 502.
https://doi.org/10.1109/IPSN.2006.243850