Contention Based Proportional Fairness (CBPF) Transmission Scheme for Time Slotted Channel Hopping Networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a contention-based proportional fairness transmission scheme for TSCH networks, optimizing throughput and resource allocation in IoT and LLN environments through convex programming and real-world testing.

Contribution

It proposes a novel CBPF scheme for TSCH that maximizes throughput and fairness, modeled as a multichannel slotted aloha, with validation through simulations and testbed implementation.

Findings

Improved throughput and fairness in TSCH networks.

Validated performance gains via simulations and IoT-LAB testing.

Enhanced resource allocation efficiency in low-power IoT networks.

Abstract

Time Slotted Channel Hopping (TSCH) is a Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol introduced in IEEE802.15.4e standard, addressing low power requirements of the Internet of Things (IoT) and Low Power Lossy Networks (LLNs). The 6TiSCH Operation sublayer (6top) of IEEE802.15.4e defines the schedule that includes sleep, transmit and receive routines of the nodes. However, the design of schedule is not specified by the standard. In this paper, we propose a contention based proportional fairness (CBPF) transmission scheme for TSCH networks to maximize the system throughput addressing fair allocation of resources to the nodes. We propose a convex programming based method to achieve the fairness and throughput objectives. We model TSCH MAC as a multichannel slotted aloha and analyse it for a schedule given by the 6top layer. Performance metrics like throughput, delay and energy spent per successful transmission are derived and validated through simulations. The proposed CBPF transmission scheme has been implemented in the IoT-LAB public testbed to evaluate its performance and to compare with the existing scheduling algorithms.