The beautiful and mystical ocean remains one of the most unexplored and inaccessible regions on earth. Underwater Sensor Networks (UWSNs) are proposed as a means for oceanic observation, offering new capabilities such as real time monitoring, remote configuration, and improved robustness. A UWSN comprises sensor nodes that communicate over multiple wireless hops to perform collaborative tasks such as environmental monitoring, military surveillance, and oceanic exploration.

Acoustic waves are used for underwater transmission, producing a communication channel that suffers from limited bandwidth, high delay, and high transmission loss. Existing data delivery schemes designed for errestrial sensor networks are unsuitable for use in the underwater environment; relatively few new schemes have been proposed for underwater use, with no single scheme emerging as the de-facto standard.

In this paper, we compare two data delivery schemes: Vector Based Forwarding and the Multipath Virtual Sink architecture, observing performance under various scenarios and evaluating characteristics from each scheme that are effective for use in Underwater Sensor Networks.

The project won 3rd prize at the Oceans 2007 student poster competition. Reference: Proceedings of the IEEE/OES OCEANS Conference, 18-21 June 2007, Aberdeen, Scotland. Link: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=4302193

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