Parent-Aware Routing for IoT Networks

Abstract

The deployment of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) accessible through the Internet has caused a growing trend for IoT (Internet of Things). RPL (IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low-Power and Lossy Networks) is proposed by IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force) for IPv6 (Internet Protocol Version 6) constrained IoT networks as the routing protocol. Here, Objective Function (OF) determines how RPL nodes translate metrics into ranks and select routes in a network. This paper introduces a solution to have a load balanced network based on Parent-Aware Objective Function (PAOF). PAOF uses both ETX (Expected Transmission Count) and parent count metrics to compute the best path for routing. This paper evaluates the proposed solution by implementing in Contiki OS (Operating System) with Cooja simulation. MRHOF (Minimum Rank with Hysteresis Objective Function) is used for comparison. Simulation results verify that PAOF gives better parent load density, delay and parent diversity.