Performance Analysis of Internet of Things Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL): Energy, Overhead and Packet Delivery

Abstract

In line with the rapid development of the Internet of Things (IoT) network, the challenges faced are ensuring the network performance is capable to support the communication of these IoT devices. As a result, the routing protocols can provide fast route discovery and network maintenance by considering the IoT network's resource constraints. This paper's main contributions are to identify compatible IoT routing protocol using qualitative method and factor that affect network performance. Routing Protocol for Low Power and Lossy Networks (RPL) is a proactive distance- vector routing protocol designed as a proposed standard to meet the requirements of the Low Power and Lossy Networks (LLN). In this project, four influential factors on the performance of RPL in Contiki OS are examined using the Cooja simulator and then RPL performance is assessed in terms of Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR), Energy consumption and Overhead control message for the network. The project provides an insight into the implications of traffic patterns, transmission ranges, network size and node mobility for different scenarios. The results of the simulation show that the PDR and overhead ratio increases proportional to transmission distances increases but decreases while radio interference is increased. From the mobility aspect, PDR decreases by an average of 19.5% when the mobility nodes expand. On the other hand, energy consumption increases by an average of 63.7% and control message size increased up to 213% when the network consists of 40 percent of mobility nodes.