Geiger & Sensor Nodes
The Geiger and Sensor Nodes are deployed in the Research Area they contain a variety of sensors from Geiger Muller Tubes, GPS Sensors, Temperature and humidity, Rain and Rain Gauge Sensors plus mnay others. They are responsible for collecting all the data immediately around and underneath the location of that specific node. These Node communicatte with each other over the ESP PainlessMesh network protocol, meaning that it is a self repairing mesh network, if one node was to lose power or communication, the other nodes in the network will re route communucations to the Root Node. Communications is carried out over 2.54GHz (Wifi). All nodes communicate using 256AES encryption. Once data is collected it is stored on an internal SD Card before being sent to the Root Node in the Network.
Root Node
The Root Node is the first port of call in the painlessMesh where data goes through before being sent ot the database stored in the Cloud. It contains a GPS sensors to gather time and date information as well as location information, All netwrok traffic passes through the Root Node. Data that passes through the Root Node gets stored on the internal SD Card for back up and future analysis. It communicatres to all the Geiger and Sensor nodes over Wifi Communications as is part of the PainlessMesh Network. Once data has been saved it then changes network protocl from PainlessMesh (Wifi) to ESP-Now (Peer-To Peer) communications, and will only communicate with a designated Gateway Node.
Gateway Node
The Gateway Node is the final Node in the network before data is sent to the internet and the database located on the servers/cloud for realtime and further data analysis. The Gateway Node has a number of connection options to the internet, this being Wifi to known wifi hot spots, followed by on board GSM Sim (Cellular Network) using NB-IOT, 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G and a final back up is utilising the StarLink satellite communications network, Starlink is used when there is no signal on Wifi or GSM Sim. As data passes through the Gateway Node it is also stored on an internal SD Card, this is the 3rd level of data backup before going to to the database. If conneciton is lost over any of the internet connection methods, this will be our first port of call for data analysis.
