Bell-X, An Opportunistic Time Synchronization Mechanism for Scheduled Wireless Sensor Networks

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is having an ever greater impact on industrial processes and the manufacturing sector, due the capabilities of massive data collection and interoperability with plant processes, key elements that are focused on the implementation of Industry 4.0. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) are one of the enabling technologies of the IIoT, due its self-configuration and self-repair capabilities to deploy ad-hoc networks. High levels of robustness and reliability, which are necessary in industrial environments, can be achieved by using the Time-Slotted Channel Hopping (TSCH) medium access the mechanism of the IEEE 802.15.4e protocol, penalizing other features, such as network connection and formation times, given that a new node does not know, a priori, the scheduling used by the network. This article proposes a new beacon advertising approach for a fast synchronization for networks under the TSCH-Medium Access Control (MAC) layer and Routing Protocol for Low-Power and Lossy Networks (RPL). This new method makes it possible to speed up the connection times of new nodes in an opportunistic way, while reducing the consumption and advertising traffic generated by the network.