Adaptive and Fair Route Update Algorithm for Low Power and Lossy Networks in the Internet of Things

Abstract

Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the network of physical objects embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies for the purpose of exchanging data with other devices over the internet. One of the routing protocols accredited to the IoT applications in Low Power and Lossy Networks is the Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL). Trickle timer algorithm is considered one of the major algorithms in the RPL used to control the flow of control messages through the network. Performance evaluation has shown that the trickle algorithm is suffering from load balancing problems. In this study, an adaptive algorithm, called the Fair-K algorithm, is introduced for maintaining routing information in Low Power and Lossy Networks. It differs from the standard Trickle in two ways. First, the Fair-K algorithm provides an elastic selection of redundancy value based on the node degree in the network. Second, it provides a new scheme in order to solve the bottleneck problem in the network. The performance evaluation of the Fair-K algorithm is validated using extensive simulation experiments. The results indicate that the Fair-K algorithm reduces the convergence time by 80%, power consumption by 20%, and the total delay by 78% while maintaining approximately the same packet delivery ratios.