A Simple Decentralized Timeslot Synchronization Algorithm for Large-Scale Wireless IoT Networks

Abstract

Rapid growth in use of wireless IoT sensors to realize smart lighting / homes / factories would add a precious asset to the existing infrastructure i.e. numerous wireless devices, which are used to transfer sensed parameters. Various applications (such as indoor localization) could be realized with this asset if it is possible to collect wireless parameters such as RSSI among all IoT sensors. An efficient way is to use token-based TDMA mechanisms where every sensor gets a transmission opportunity in the assigned timeslot. But, synchronizing timeslots to identify transmission instant in a large-scale sensor network is a challenging task. In this paper, we propose a simple decentralized timeslot synchronization algorithm that could realize any TDMA based RSSI accumulation protocol in an ultra-efficient way compared to conventional schemes and evaluated using an event based simulator developed in Matlab.