Patent ID: 8310977

Claim:
A wireless repeater for relaying data between two nodes of a sensor network, the repeater comprising: a first signal processor configured to amplify received data, the received data comprising a leading portion and a subsequent portion subsequent to the leading portion in the data; a path controller configured to route the leading portion to a data selection processor and further configured to route the subsequent portion to a second signal processor only in response to a command to route the subsequent portion to the second signal processor received from the data selection processor; said path controller comprising a switching controller configured to detect the leading portion comprising source information indicative of a source of the data, and further configured to detect the subsequent portion lacking the source information; a switch configured to switch between the data selection processor and the second signal processor for routing the leading portion and the subsequent portion in accordance with detection by the switching controller said second signal processor configured to amplify the subsequent portion for wireless transmission; and said data selection processor configured to analyze the leading portion and determine whether the repeater is responsible for retransmitting the received data based on the result of analyzing the leading portion, wherein the data selection processor is further configured to send the command to route the subsequent portion to the second signal processor to the path controller if it is determined that the repeater is responsible for retransmitting the data.