We present an interactive visualization system for exploring the coverage in sensor networks with uncertain sensor locations. We consider a simple case of uncertainty where the location of each sensor is confined to a discrete number of points sampled uniformly at random from a region with a fixed radius. Employing techniques from topological data analysis, we model and visualize network coverage by quantifying the uncertainty defined on its simplicial complex representations. We demonstrate the capabilities and effectiveness of our tool via the exploration of randomly distributed sensor networks.
 In their seminal work on homological sensor networks, de Silva and Ghrist showed the surprising fact that it's possible to certify the coverage of a coordinate-free sensor network even with very minimal knowledge of the space to be covered. Here, coverage means that every point in the domain (except possibly those very near the boundary) has a nearby sensor. More generally, their algorithm takes a pair of nested neighborhood graphs along with a labeling of vertices as either boundary or interior and computes the relative homology of a simplicial complex induced by the graphs. This approach, called the Topological Coverage Criterion (TCC), requires some assumptions about the underlying geometric domain as well as some assumptions about the relationship of the input graphs to the domain. The goal of this paper is to generalize these assumptions and show how the TCC can be applied to both much more general domains as well as very weak assumptions on the input. We give a new, simpler proof of the de Silva-Ghrist Topological Coverage Criterion that eliminates any assumptions about the smoothness of the boundary of the underlying space, allowing the results to be applied to much more general problems. The new proof factors the geometric, topological, and combinatorial aspects, allowing us to provide a coverage condition that supports thick boundaries, k-coverage, and weighted coverage, in which sensors have varying radii.  Tools from computational homology are introduced to verify coverage in an idealized sensor network. These methods are unique in that, while they are coordinate-free and assume no localization or orientation capabilities for the nodes, there are also no probabilistic assumptions. The key ingredient is the theory of homology from algebraic topology. The robustness of these tools is demonstrated by adapting them to a variety of settings, including static planar coverage, 3-D barrier coverage, and time-dependent sweeping coverage. Results are also given on hole repair, error tolerance, optimal coverage, and variable radii. An overview of implementation is given. In the study of sensor networks, many applications require topological analysis, and for some problems topological information is even sufficient. Here, we review how algebraic topology (and specifically simplicial homology theory) can be used as a general framework for detection of coverage holes in a coordinate-free sensor network. Extensions to distributed processing and localization algorithms are also reviewed, before progressing into discussion of a new way to apply algebraic topological methods to the analysis of coverage properties in dynamic sensor networks. Zigzag persistent homology is a recently developed method to track homological features (such as holes) over a sequence of spaces. This paper demonstrates the promise of this method for the identification of coverage holes in a time-varying coordinate-free sensor network, as well as the designation of coverage holes as significant or not, based on the length of time they are present in the sequence. Suppose that ball-shaped sensors wander in a bounded domain. A sensor does not know its location but does know when it overlaps a nearby sensor. We say that an evasion path exists in this sensor network if a moving intruder can avoid detection. In 'Coordinate-free coverage in sensor networks with controlled boundaries via homology', Vin de Silva and Robert Ghrist give a necessary condition, depending only on the time-varying connectivity data of the sensors, for an evasion path to exist. Using zigzag persistent homology, we provide an equivalent condition that moreover can be computed in a streaming fashion. However, no method with time-varying connectivity data as input can give necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of an evasion path. Indeed, we show that the existence of an evasion path depends not only on the fibrewise homotopy type of the region covered by sensors but also on its embedding in spacetime. For planar sensors that also measure weak rotation and distance information, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of an evasion path.  We study the problem of computing zigzag persistence of a sequence of homology groups and study a particular sequence derived from the levelsets of a real-valued function on a topological space. The result is a local, symmetric interval descriptor of the function. Our structural results establish a connection between the zigzag pairs in this sequence and extended persistence, and in the process resolve an open question associated with the latter. Our algorithmic results not only provide a way to compute zigzag persistence for any sequence of homology groups, but combined with our structural results give a novel algorithm for computing extended persistence. This algorithm is easily parallelizable and uses (asymptotically) less memory.