Title: Distributed Detection Systems in Wireless Sensor Networks

We consider the problem of fusing decisions in a distributed detection system when the binary decisions made at the sensors are transmitted over error-prone wireless channels, subject to fading and noise, to a fusion center (CF) which is tasked with making the final decision. In an effort to design strategies that combat the fading effects and consume less bandwidth, we propose a communication architecture, in which neighboring sensors communicate with the FC, after exchanging their decisions. This architecture allows us to mitigate the fading effect via utilizing space-time coding and providing diversity gain, and also halve the number of required orthogonal channels. We derive the optimal Likelihood ratio test (LRT) fusion rule and its low and high SNR approximations and verify the effectiveness of the proposed scheme via numerical analysis.