Low bit-rate video transmission over wireless Zigbee networks

The emerging IEEE 802.15.4 (Zigbee) standard is designed for low data rate, low power consumption and low cost wireless personal area networks (WPANs). Video transmission over such networks is considered an issue since video traffic demands high data rates.; Video surveillance applications can be used for cost effective deployments. However, for an acceptable video quality, the transmission of video over such networks is considered an issue since video traffic contains a large amount of information that requires high data rates. In this thesis, the performance of a video surveillance application is analyzed over wireless Zigbee networks using ns-2 simulations.; The Transform-Expand-Sample (TES) methodology is used to model a low data-rate MPEG4 video. A rate control variable bit-rate algorithm (RC-VBR) adapted to MPEG4 variable bit-rate (VBR) video coders is developed over Zigbee networks. A region-of-interest (ROI) encoding is added to the rate control algorithm to capture the important parts of the frame which is suitable for IEEE 802.15.4 (Zigbee) networks.; The IEEE 802.15.4 network can improve the aggregate throughput by using multiple channels that are available in the radio spectrum allocated by the standard. A multi-channel over IEEE 802.15.4 network architecture is investigated by equipping each Zigbee node with multiple 802.15.4 network interface cards (NICs).; A Zigbee network will enable a large number of surveillance applications to operate over a personal area network.