Mode switch - Adaptive use of delay-sensitive or energy-aware communication in IEEE 802.15.4-based networks

Abstract--We propose "mode switch", an adaptive loadsensitive solution that supports both an energy-efficient operation mode for transmitting normal sensor data and an QoSaware low-latency mode for high priority emergency messages. Typically, sensor networks are considered to operate efficiently w.r.t. energy consumption. A good example is the IEEE 802.15.4 protocol, which has mainly been designed for this purpose. The standard IEEE 802.15.4 beacon-enabled cluster-tree topology supports energy-efficient operation for low-rate data transmissions. However, in the case of detected alarms, high-priority emergency messages need to be transmitted with low-latency and guaranteed delivery. In this case, the cluster-tree topology appears to be inefficient and cannot provide the needed support. In this paper, we show how energy-efficiency and delay-sensitivity can be combined by developing an adaptive solution that completely switches between the fundamentally different operation modes...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2010
• Where: MASS
• Authors: Feng Chen, Xiaoyu Tong, Edith Ngar, Falko Dressler
• Keywords: Communications, Energy-efficient Operation, Energy-efficient Operation Mode, MASS 2010, Mode Switch