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📡 IoT Sensor Network

Simulate an IoT sensor network with temperature, humidity, and motion sensors. Model sampling rates, data transmission, battery consumption, and edge computing filtering to extend node lifetime.

IoT & Smart City3DEasy60 FPS

About this simulation

This simulator models a small wireless sensor network of eight nodes (temperature, humidity and motion) reporting to a single gateway over an MQTT-style link. It animates packet flow while computing node lifetime from the battery equation T = C / (I_active·D + I_sleep·(1−D)), where the duty cycle D governs how long each radio stays awake. Toggling edge processing and a Kalman filter lets you see how local aggregation and smoothing cut bandwidth and trade latency for longer field deployment.

🔬 What it shows

Eight sensor nodes arranged around a central gateway, with packets travelling along each link at the chosen transmit interval. Battery life is derived from a 3600 mAh cell, an active current of 15 + 0.5·fs mA and a near-zero sleep current, weighted by duty cycle. Data rate assumes 8-byte readings across all nodes, reduced to 30% when edge aggregation is enabled.

🎮 How to use

The sliders set sampling rate (1–20 Hz), transmit interval (1–30 s) and duty cycle (1–50%). Preset buttons load Smart Home, Industrial and Agriculture profiles. Two checkboxes toggle the Kalman filter and edge processing; the side panel reports data rate, average battery life, packet loss, latency and bandwidth saved as you adjust them.

💡 Did you know?

Radio duty cycling is the single biggest lever for sensor longevity: keeping the transceiver asleep for 95% of the time, rather than 50%, can stretch a coin-cell node from weeks to years, because transmitting consumes far more power than sensing.

Frequently asked questions

What is an IoT sensor network?

An IoT sensor network is a collection of low-power devices that measure physical quantities such as temperature, humidity or motion and forward those readings wirelessly to a gateway or cloud service. This simulation shows eight nodes reporting to one gateway, which is a typical star topology used in smart homes, factories and farms.

How is the battery life calculated?

It uses the formula T = C / (I_active·D + I_sleep·(1−D)). Here C is the cell capacity (3600 mAh), I_active rises with the sampling rate as 15 + 0.5·fs mA, I_sleep is a tiny 0.01 mA, and D is the duty cycle fraction. The result is the time before an average node depletes, shown in hours or months.

What does the duty cycle slider do?

The duty cycle sets the proportion of time a node keeps its radio and electronics active rather than sleeping. A lower duty cycle dramatically extends battery life, but if it drops below about 5% the model also flags higher packet loss, because the node is awake too rarely to receive reliably.

Why do edge processing and the Kalman filter help?

Edge processing aggregates and filters readings on or near the node before transmission, which the model treats as a roughly 70% reduction in bandwidth and a green packet colour. The Kalman filter smooths noisy sensor data by predicting and correcting each estimate, improving accuracy at the cost of a small amount of added latency.

Is this simulation physically accurate?

It is a simplified but representative teaching model. The battery, data-rate and current relationships follow the correct functional forms used in wireless sensor network design, but the constants are illustrative rather than vendor-specific. Real deployments must also account for radio interference, protocol overhead, temperature effects on cells and varying link quality.

Frequently Asked Questions

What communication protocols are used in IoT networks?

Short-range protocols include Bluetooth LE, Zigbee, Z-Wave, and Wi-Fi. Medium-range protocols include Thread and 6LoWPAN. Long-range, low-power wide-area (LPWA) protocols include LoRaWAN (private networks, kilometres range), Sigfox, NB-IoT, and LTE-M (cellular-based). The choice depends on range, power budget, data rate, and infrastructure requirements.

What is MQTT and why is it used in IoT?

MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport) is a lightweight publish-subscribe messaging protocol designed for constrained devices and unreliable networks. Devices publish data to a broker under topic names; subscribers receive messages on their topics. Its minimal overhead (2-byte fixed header) and support for QoS levels make it ideal for IoT applications from smart meters to industrial sensors.

How is security handled in IoT networks?

IoT security requires multiple layers: secure boot and firmware signing on devices, TLS/DTLS encryption for communications, certificate-based or pre-shared-key authentication, network segmentation to isolate IoT devices from critical IT systems, and regular over-the-air (OTA) firmware updates to patch vulnerabilities. Many deployed IoT devices lack adequate security, making them targets for botnets and attacks on critical infrastructure.

What is edge computing and why is it important for IoT?

Edge computing processes data at or near the sensor, on a local gateway or microcontroller, rather than sending raw data to the cloud. Benefits include lower latency for time-critical decisions, reduced bandwidth usage, continued operation during internet outages, and privacy preservation by keeping sensitive data local. Machine learning models can be deployed on edge devices for real-time inference.

What is a digital twin in the context of IoT?

A digital twin is a virtual model of a physical asset, system, or process, continuously synchronised with real-world sensor data via IoT connectivity. It enables monitoring of current state, simulation of future scenarios, predictive maintenance, and optimisation without touching the physical system. Digital twins are used for wind turbines, factory floors, buildings, and entire city infrastructure systems.

⚙ Under the hood

IoT sensor network simulation with MQTT, edge computing and Kalman filter for sensor fusion.

IoTMQTTsensoredge computingKalman filter

3D · Three.js / WebGL renderer · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install