Abstract
An energy-efficient, reliable and timely data transmission is essential for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) employed in scenarios where plant information must be available for control applications. The protocol is based on randomized routing, medium access control, and duty-cycling jointly optimized for energy efficiency. The design approach relies on a constrained optimization problem, whereby the objective function is the energy consumption and the constraints are the packet reliability and delay. The optimal working point of the protocol is achieved by a simple algorithm, which adapts to traffic variations and channel conditions with negligible overhead. The protocol has been implemented and experimentally evaluated on a test bed with off-the-shelf wireless sensor nodes, and it has been compared with a standard IEEE 802.15.4 solution. Analytical and experimental results show that Breath is tuneable and meets reliability and delay requirements. Breath exhibits a good distribution of the working load, thus ensuring a long lifetime of the network. Therefore, Breath is a good candidate for efficient, reliable, and timely data gathering for control applications.