Time Segmentation Approach Allowing QoS and Energy Saving for Wireless Sensor Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces MaCARI, a time segmentation protocol for wireless sensor networks that enhances energy efficiency and QoS by synchronizing node activity and managing access delays, validated through analysis, simulation, and real tests.

Contribution

The paper presents MaCARI, a novel time segmentation protocol that improves energy efficiency and guarantees QoS in wireless sensor networks, inspired by ZigBee's cluster-tree topology.

Findings

MaCARI reduces energy consumption significantly.

It guarantees bounded end-to-end delays.

The protocol's effectiveness is validated analytically, via simulation, and real testbed measurements.

Abstract

Wireless sensor networks are conceived to monitor a certain application or physical phenomena and are supposed to function for several years without any human intervention for maintenance. Thus, the main issue in sensor networks is often to extend the lifetime of the network by reducing energy consumption. On the other hand, some applications have high priority traffic that needs to be transferred within a bounded end-to-end delay while maintaining an energy efficient behavior. We propose MaCARI, a time segmentation protocol that saves energy, improves the overall performance of the network and enables quality of service in terms of guaranteed access to the medium and end-to-end delays. This time segmentation is achieved by synchronizing the activity of nodes using a tree-based beacon propagation and allocating activity periods for each cluster of nodes. The tree-based topology is inspired from the cluster-tree proposed by the ZigBee standard. The efficiency of our protocol is proven analytically, by simulation and through real testbed measurements.