Wireless Information and Power Transfer in Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Wireless information and power transfer (WIPT) enables simultaneously communications and sustainable power supplement without the erection of power supply lines and the replacement operation of the batteries for the terminals. The application of WIPT to the underwater acoustic sensor networks (UWASNs) not only retains the long range communication capabilities, but also provides an auxiliary and convenient energy supplement way for the terminal sensors, and thus is a promising scheme to solve the energy-limited problem for the UWASNs. In this paper, we propose the integration of WIPT into the UWASNs and provide an overview on various enabling techniques for the WIPT based UWASNs (WIPT-UWASNs) as well as pointing out future research challenges and opportunities for WIPT-UWASNs.