LPDQ: A self-scheduled TDMA MAC protocol for one-hop dynamic low-power wireless networks

• Published in: Pervasive and mobile computing 2015-07, Vol.20, p.84-99
• Main Authors: Tuset-Peiro, Pere, Vazquez-Gallego, Francisco, Alonso-Zarate, Jesus, Alonso, Luis, Vilajosana, Xavier
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: colas distribuidas; Computer networks; comunicaciones máquina a máquina; comunicacions màquina-màquina; control d'accés mitjà; control de acceso medio; cua distribuïda; Distributed Queuing; frame Aloha ranurado; frame Aloha ranurat; Frame Slotted ALOHA; internet de las cosas; internet de les coses; Internet of Things; Machine-to-Machine communications; Medium Access Control; Ordenadores, Redes de; Ordinadors, Xarxes d
• ISSN: 1574-1192; 1873-1589
• DOI: 10.1016/j.pmcj.2014.09.004

Current Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols for data collection scenarios with a large number of nodes that generate bursty traffic are based on Low-Power Listening (LPL) for network synchronization and Frame Slotted ALOHA (FSA) as the channel access mechanism. However, FSA has an efficiency bounded to 36.8% due to contention effects, which reduces packet throughput and increases energy consumption. In this paper, we target such scenarios by presenting Low-Power Distributed Queuing (LPDQ), a highly efficient and low-power MAC protocol. LPDQ is able to self-schedule data transmissions, acting as a FSA MAC under light traffic and seamlessly converging to a Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) MAC under congestion. The paper presents the design principles and the implementation details of LPDQ using low-power commercial radio transceivers. Experiments demonstrate an efficiency close to 99% that is independent of the number of nodes and is fair in terms of resource allocation.