An integrated approach to the design of wireless sensor networks for structural health monitoring

Wireless Sensor Networks are a promising technology for the implementation of Structural Health Monitoring systems, since they allow to increase the diffusion of measurements in the structure and to reduce the sensor deployment effort and the overall costs. In this paper, possible benefits and critical issues related with the use of Wireless Sensor Networks for structural monitoring are analysed, specifically addressing network design strategies oriented to the damage detection problem. A global cost function is defined and used for the definition of possible design methodologies. Among the various approach, the use of an integrated strategy, able to take advantage of a preliminary structural analysis is considered. Moreover, the implementation of a distributed processing is an explored strategy for an overall improvement of system performances. Benefits of this methodology are finally demonstrated through the analysis of a representative case study, the IASC-ASCE benchmark problem.