A brief survey of self‐organization in wireless sensor networks

Abstract Many natural and man‐made systems exhibit self‐organization, where interactions among components lead to system‐wide patterns of behavior. This paper first introduces current, scientific understanding of self‐organizing systems and then identifies the main models investigated by computer scientists seeking to apply self‐organization to design large, distributed systems. Subsequently, the paper surveys research that uses models of self‐organization in wireless sensor networks to provide a variety of functions: sharing processing and communication capacity; forming and maintaining structures; conserving power; synchronizing time; configuring software components; adapting behavior associated with routing, with disseminating and querying for information, and with allocating tasks; and providing resilience by repairing faults and resisting attacks. The paper closes with a summary of open issues that must be addressed before self‐organization can be applied routinely during design and deployment of senor networks and other distributed, computer systems. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.