On interference among moving sensors and related problems

Abstract

We show that for any set of $n$ moving points in $\Re^d$ and any parameter $2 \le k \le n$, one can select a fixed non-empty subset of the points of size $O(k \log k)$, such that the Voronoi diagram of this subset is ``balanced'' at any given time (i.e., it contains $O(n/k)$ points per cell). We also show that the bound $O(k \log k)$ is near optimal even for the one dimensional case in which points move linearly in time. As an application, we show that one can assign communication radii to the sensors of a network of $n$ moving sensors so that at any given time, their interference is $O(\sqrt{n\log n})$. This is optimal up to an $O(\sqrt{\log n})$ factor. In order to obtain these results, we extend well-known results from $\varepsilon$-net theory to kinetic environments