On the synchronization of co-located IEEE 802.15.4 networks for IoT applications

Abstract

With the coming wide-spread deployment of Internet of Things (IoT) applications, particularly robustness of the wireless transmissions becomes an issue. We focus on the IEEE 802.15.4 MAC protocol, which has been widely adopted for a variety of Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) applications. IEEE 802.15.4 defines a node synchronization strategy using beacons for achieving robust and real-time capable low energy communication within the WPAN. However, problems arise when there are many co-located networks within the same transmission area. This problem has been identified in the literature considering the many possible configuration options for the protocols' superframe structure. In this paper, we propose a novel scheme that enables WPANs to overhear beacon information from neighboring networks in order to mitigate interference by adjusting the beacon transmission time. We analyzed the scheme in an extensive set of simulations and can confirm its ability to overcome a majority of the collision-prone situations.