CREAT: A Research Project of CS&IT

A Dual Radio Wireless Mesh Network for Application in Disaster Management and Healthcare

A Research Project at Centre for Emerging and Applied Technologies (CREAT) at University of Gujrat

Introduction:

University of Gujrat provides both focus and infrastructure at Centre for Research in Emerging and Applied Technologies (CREAT) at Faculty of CS&IT, within which applied research and development projects in the area of Wireless Networks, Knowledge Management Systems, Software Engineering and Robotics are undertaken. While the CREAT also undertakes “theoretical” research, in terms of the development of new models and approaches to the design and implementation of computer based information systems, “applied” research forms the basis of our work. Applied research seeks to develop solutions that are practically applicable to problems faced by a particular society or community.

We possess a dual radio Wireless Mesh Network technology at Center for Research in Emerging and Applied Technologies (CREAT), 8 Network Devices each costs approximately Rs. 40,000 along with other multimedia equipments are funded by SwanMesh Research Group UK which is working in collaboration with Swansea University, UK.

Figure 1 Outdoor deployment of developed dual Radio Wireless Mesh Network Router for Performance Evaluation in an urban environment

Figure 2 The Hardware of the developed WMN Router

Figure 3 VOIP hardware used during the outdoor VOIP tests

Figure 4 Developed Wireless Mesh Network Devices and other Multimedia Hardware

Figure-2 shows the image of the developed router which has been deployed in an outdoor environment to evaluate the performance of the network. A router node was also deployed on top of a tall building as indicated in the Figure-1. A car client was used to test the Video over wireless, Voice over IP and Broadband service. Figure-3 shows the wireless phones that are used for the testing of Voice over IP services and Figure-4 shows the complete equipment.

Currently BS Final year students at Faculty of CS&IT have undertaken several publishable projects to further enhance the functionality and routing of the wireless networks.

Features of the developed wireless mesh network:

Following are the features of developed wireless mesh network
Efficient Linux Operating System: The operating system Swan Linux is a customized Debain distribution, specific for the developed Swan Mesh. It is small and efficient and supports the latest Linux Kernel.
Two-radio wireless mesh network: One radio (802.11a) is used to form the backbone of the network and another radio (802.11g/b) is used to serve the clients.
Support voice over wireless networks (VoIP).
Support for Multimedia communication
Multiple layers security.
AAA network access control.
WPA2 (Wi-Fi Protected Access ) certification
AES (Advanced Encryption Systems) encrypted VPN for node-to-node connections (256-bit AES)
SSL security
Web-based management system

Advantages of the network
Following are the advantages of the network which makes it very suitable technology for application in emergency and disaster recovery and healthcare:

Self-organisation, self-management and self-healing nature is the main characteristic of a wireless mesh network, where each node works out the routing to automatically form the network. When any node in the network fails, other nodes will remove the routes to it and establish new routes through a different node, to automatically manage the network.
Network topology changes dynamically Because of the self-organisation of a mesh network, the mesh topology changes dynamically when nodes are added, removed, replaced or relocated. Thus the rescue teams do not require any IT training to establish the network.
It provides variation in scale Just add more nodes. The routing configuration is automatic, and there is no exponential rise in complexity as the network grows.
Gateway nodes provide internet connection in the network. There is decreased need for Internet gateways as one gateway can share the internet connection with multiple nodes.
Service coverage in geographically large areas which makes it very suitable technology to provide rescue during natural disasters such as flood and earthquake.
It doesn’t require extensive cabling to be laid; therefore a network could be established in minutes on a disaster site.
Lower cost of infrastructure.
Lower cost of operations.
Each node is connected to several other nodes and if one drops out of the network, its neighbors simply find another route.
The ability to configure the network and routes dynamically

Envisioned application of the project in the area of Disaster Management:

Natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes and cyclones can affect large geographical areas resulting in significant impact on the network infrastructures, water, electricity, transport and communications. A quick response to provide the disaster rescue operation in affected areas is very critical to saving many lives. One of the major aftermaths of these disaster situations is the destruction of the traditional infrastructure for communication. Unfortunately, rescue operations after such events are hampered by the lack of functioning communication infrastructures. The loss of communication systems makes rescue and relief operations extremely difficult which results in heavy loss of lives. Therefore establishing a temporary alternative communication network to support emergency communications is one of the most urgent tasks in a disaster rescue mission.

The nature of developed wireless mesh networks makes them suitable to deploy as an alternative communication network to facilitate an emergency and disaster recovery operation. The characteristics and advantages described in previous sections makes our dual radio Wireless Mesh Network a useful and feasible solution for communication services in extreme emergency situations where the fast and effective deployment of a communication network infrastructure is impossible.

Rescue teams in each stricken area consist of a few trained professional squads: police, army, fire fighters, medical professionals and potentially many hundreds or thousands of disorganized volunteers. During large scale disasters these rescue teams have to work simultaneously at different disaster affected geographical locations as shown in the example scenario figure 5. Therefore an emergency response usually requires a central control to coordinate the rescue efforts being carried by different teams at different locations. WMN provides that central control through gateway nodes which connect to the backbone external network, thus building a bridge between the WMN and external networks in order to share and exchange the critical information via www, email and ftp. It enables the command centers to rely on a fully operational multimedia enabled wireless mesh network and helps to learn about on-going situations to allocate and guide the rescue teams.

Figure 5 A WMN application in emergency and disaster recovery application scenario

The multimedia capabilities of developed dual radio Wireless Mesh Network can enable these rescue teams to coordinate from a distance for situational awareness, sharing information with each other for planning and decision making. In order to co-ordinate emergency response to a large scale natural disaster an incident commander at each site is usually required to control the onsite command centre. The incident commander is responsible for co-ordinate among several teams and for allocating each team with the required resources based on their needs. The multimedia capability of WMN feed the command centre and rescue teams with a more accurate view of the situation, contributing to the efficient allocation of the resources. The mobile devices such as laptops, PDAs, wireless cameras and VoIP phones are used during the rescue operations which connect to wireless mesh nodes as clients to share the information. Moreover, today’s portable mobile devices have reached a system performance level which make them possible to host more sophisticated software applications.

Envisioned application of the project in the area of Healthcare

An ideal application of WMN in healthcare sector that we plan to develop in our centre for Research in Emerging and Applied Technologies (CREAT) in collaboration with NAWAZ SHARIF Medical College at University of Gujrat. Currently 8 Million project proposal to HEC is under review to fund the project.

The proposed system is an intelligent, self-organized, self-managed, and reliable network which connects patients, physicians, medical administration and technical staff.

WMN technology can be used to connect Patients, Physicians, Hospital Administration and Technical Staff from different locations which enables the doctors to remotely provide medical care to patients suffering from chronic diseases which requires continues monitoring.

For example a patient located in the remote suburban area suffering from a chronic disease can be equipped with a mobile hand held device which can seamlessly connect to the medical sensor. The handheld device can broadcast sensor readings to the server using the internet which is available on most of the devices these days. Thus the live medical sensor readings can be recorded at the server which keeps the medical administration well informed on the changing medical condition of the patients, without the patient being hospitalized. With the proposed wireless networked healthcare system, the medical staff can be automatically alarmed when an attention is needed by the patients with the help of wireless medical sensors. This not only helps a doctor to observe a patient’s condition to avoid unnecessary laboratory tests and harmful medication, but also alarm the medical staff to be prepared forehand to deal with the emergencies. Furthermore, the patients can be cured intensive care can be provided at their homes through the proposed system.

For further information please contact the focal person:

Dr. Mudasser Iqbal
Director,
Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology
m.iqbal@uog.edu.pk
0300 8620892