ICTC 2014 1569997953

A Study on the Vehicular Wireless Base-Station for

In-Vehicle Wireless Sensor Network System
*Doo Seop Yun, Seung-Jun Lee, and Do Hyun Kim
Vehicle Interaction Research Section
Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute
218, Gajeongno, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon, 305-700, Korea
{*dooseop.yun, lsj0209, dohyun}@etri.re.kr

Abstract— In this paper, we study on the vehicular wireless base-
station for in-vehicle wireless sensor network system. We
introduce in-vehicle wireless sensor network system applying
wireless sensor network technologies. The in-vehicle wireless
sensor network system greatly consists of the vehicular wireless
base-station, vehicular wireless sensor nodes, and wireless OBD
(On-Board Diagnostics) module. Here, we describe the vehicular
wireless base-station as sub-system of in-vehicle wireless sensor
network system. The vehicular wireless base-station carries out
roles which process ECU (Electronics Control Unit) information
obtained from wireless OBD module and sensor information
received from a number of vehicular wireless sensor nodes.
Keywords— In-vehicle wireless sensor network system, vehicular
wireless base-station, vehicular wireless sensor node, wireless
OBD module, ECU information, sensor information.
I. INTRODUCTION
Recently, wireless sensor network (WSN) technologies
have been applied to various application areas such as smart
building, hospital, chemical plant, healthcare, home network,
vehicle, and agricultural industries [1]. So, the domestic and
foreign vehicle industries are many efforts to apply WSN
technologies to in-vehicle system. Although the vehicle’s
performance has been improved continuously, the vehicle’s
wiring harness is increased gradually due to the in-vehicle
sensors and ECUs [2]. The vehicle’s wiring harness results in
problems such as the decline of fuel efficiency and complexity
increase of vehicle development.
As the related works, General Motors and Carnegie Mellon
University introduced problems of in-vehicle wired
communication and developed the intra-car wireless sensor
networks for developing wireless sensor network between the
ECUs and sensors [3].
Therefore, we study on the vehicular wireless base-station
which is sub-system of in-vehicle wireless sensor network
system in order to apply WSN technologies as the detailed
development of the technology for wireless automotive sensor
networks and the smart vehicle.
II. IN-VEHICLE WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORK SYSTEM
Fig. 1 shows the conceptual figure of the in-vehicle
wireless sensor network system. The in-vehicle wireless sensor
network system consists of a vehicular wireless base-station, a
number of vehicular wireless sensor nodes, and a wireless
OBD module. The vehicular wireless base-station processes
ECU information obtained from wireless OBD module and
generates operating commands according to the processed
ECU information to operate vehicular wireless sensor nodes.
The wireless OBD module is mounted to vehicle’s OBD
connector to collect ECU information through in-vehicle
network such as CAN (Controller Area Network). The
generated operating commands are transmitted to vehicular
wireless sensor nodes. Here, the vehicular wireless sensor
nodes can be installed randomly to in-vehicle electronic
components. The vehicular wireless base-station receives
sensor information from each vehicular wireless sensor node
and processes the received sensor information. Finally, the
ECU information and sensor information are transmitted to
smart-phone (or head unit) to be provided to vehicle driver.
In this way, this system aims to provide
convenience/safety-related services such as parking assistance
system, TPMS (Tire Pressure Monitoring System) and air-
conditioner system.
Figure 1. The conceptual figure of the in-vehicle wireless sensor network
system

This paper is organized as follows: In the next section, we
will introduce in-vehicle wireless sensor network system
applying wireless sensor network technology. In Section 3, we
will describe the vehicular wireless base-station. Finally, the
conclusion is made in Section 4.
III. THE VEHICULAR WIRELESS BASE-STATION
Fig. 2 shows the hardware block diagram of the vehicular
wireless base-station. The vehicular wireless base-station

This work was supported by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future
Planning/Korea Research Council for Industrial Science and Technology
under an intelligent situation cognition and IoT basic technology development
project.[The Development of Wireless Automotive Sensor Networks
Technology and Smart Vehicle]

978-1-4799-6786-5/14/$31.00 ©2014 IEEE 609 ICTC 2014

1
includes MCU (Micro Control Unit) part, power part, ZigBee
communication part, and Bluetooth communication part.
MCU part uses TI’s MSP 430F5438 chip which consumes
low-energy and is suitable for in-vehicle environment. MCU
part processes OBD information and sensor information.
Bluetooth communication part uses CC2540 chip (Bluetooth
system-on-chip) to communicate with smart-phone (or head
unit), and transmit ECU information and sensor information to
smart-phone (or head unit).
ZigBee communication part uses CC2520 (RF transceiver)
to communicate with vehicular wireless sensor nodes, transmit
operating commands to vehicular wireless sensor nodes, and
receive sensor information. Also, ZigBee communication part
carries out communication with wireless OBD module. This
part transmits operating commands to wireless OBD module
and receives ECU information. The power part supplies power
to MCU, ZigBee RF transceiver, and Bluetooth.
UART (universal asynchronous receiver transmitter)
interface is used for data communication between MCU part
and Bluetooth communication part. SPI (Serial peripheral
interface) is used for data communication between MCU part
and ZigBee communication part.
Figure 2. The hardware block diagram of the vehicular wireless base-station
We apply TDMA (Time Division Multiple Access) based
MAC (Media Access Control) which uses PHY (Physical)
layer of IEEE 802.15.4 for data communication among
vehicular wireless base-station, vehicular wireless sensor nodes
and wireless OBD module. TDMA based MAC supports
superframe structure to perform time synchronization and data
transmission/reception in real-time.
Fig. 3 shows the superframe structure. The superframe
structure is divided to beacon period, CAP (Contention Access
Period), and CFP (Contention Free Period). The superframe
consists of 20 time slots and the beacon interval sets up 100ms.
The time slot of superframe is allocated based on 5ms per 1
slot.
The beacon periods are allocated for transmitting beacon
frame which synchronizes time of wireless devices. The
vehicular wireless base-station broadcasts a beacon frame
periodically to vehicular wireless sensor and wireless OBD
module. Then, vehicular wireless base-station, vehicular
wireless sensor and wireless OBD module form in-vehicle
wireless sensor network by carrying out time synchronization.
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The beacon frame includes operating command to operate
wireless OBD module. Also, this frame includes operating
commands generated according to ECU information in order to
operate vehicular wireless sensor nodes. The vehicular wireless
base-station transmits beacon frame including operating
command to vehicular wireless sensor or wireless OBD module.
The CAP is used for one to one communication. The
vehicular wireless base-station can configure parameters of
vehicular wireless sensor nodes and wireless OBD module by
using time slots of CAP. The CFP is used for receiving ECU
information and sensor information. The first slot of CFP is
allocated for receiving ECU information from wireless OBD
module. The other slots are allocated for receiving sensor
information from vehicular wireless sensor nodes.
Each slot period guarantees time for transmitting/receiving
data frame and ACK frame between the vehicular wireless
base-station and other wireless devices. Therefore, vehicular
wireless sensor nodes and wireless OBD module transmits
ECU information and sensor information in allocated time
according to synchronization information.
Figure 3. The superframe structure
IV. CONCLUSION
In this paper, we studied on the vehicular wireless base-
station for in-vehicle wireless sensor network system. We
introduced in-vehicle wireless sensor network system applying
wireless sensor network technologies. We described the
vehicular wireless base-station as sub-system of in-vehicle
wireless sensor network system. The vehicular wireless base-
station carries out roles which process ECU information
obtained from wireless OBD module and sensor information
received from a number of vehicular wireless sensor nodes.
As the future works, we will develop the vehicular wireless
base-station base on this research to verify usefulness and
effectiveness of the vehicular wireless base-station. And, we
will analyze wireless sensor network environment for the
inside of vehicle as interworking with vehicular wireless sensor
nodes and a wireless OBD module.
REFERENCES
[1] P. Kumar, A. Gurtov, M. Ylianttila, S. G. Lee, and H. J. Lee, “A Strong
Authentication Scheme with User Privacy for Wireless Sensor
Networks,” ETRI Journal, vol. 35, pp. 889–899, October 2013.
[2] D. S. Yun, S. J. Lee, and D. H. Kim, “A Study on the Architecture of the
In-Vehicle Wireless Sensor Network System,” International Conference
on Connected Vehicles and Expo, Las Vegas, USA, pp. 826-827,
December, 2013.
[3] H.M. Tsai,“Intra-car Wireless Sensor Networks", Carnegie Mellon Univ.,
Pittsburgh, USA, May 2010.