A Reliable Routing Algorithm for Delay Sensitive Data in Body Area Networks

Wireless body Area networks (WBANs) include a number of sensor nodes placed inside or on the human body to improve patient health and quality of life. Ensuring the transfer and receipt of data in sensitive data is a very important issue. Routing algorithms should support a variety of service quality such as reliability and delay in sending and receiving data. Loss of information or excessive data delay can lead to loss of human life. A proper routing algorithm in WBAN networks provides an efficient route with minimum delay and higher reliability for sensitive data. In this context, a routing algorithm, as it is proposed, categorizes patient data into sensitive and non-sensitive. Sensitive packets are transmitted to the destination through the shortest route to have less delay and non-sensitive packets are transmitted from other routes. Simulation shows that the proposed algorithm performs better, in terms of the throughput than the DMQoS and RL-QRP this superiority; as a result, decreases the latency of the end

Modeling induction and routing to monitor hospitalized patients in multi-hop mobility-aware body area sensor networks

In wireless body area sensor networks (WBASNs), energy efficiency is an area of extreme significance. At first, we present a mathematical model for a non-invasive inductive link which is used to recharge the battery of an implanted biomedical device (pacemaker). Afterwards, we propose a distance-aware relaying energy-efficient (DARE) and mutual information-based DARE (MI-DARE) routing protocols for multihop mobility-aware body area sensor networks (MM-BASNs). Both the routing protocols and the non-invasive inductive link model are tested with the consideration of eight patients in a hospital unit under different topologies, where the vital signs of each patient are monitored through seven on-body sensors and an implanted pacemaker. To reduce energy consumption of the network, the sensors communicate with a sink via an on-body relay which is fixed on the chest of each patient. The behavior (static/mobile) and position of the sink are changed in each topology, and the impact of mobility due to postural changes of the patient(s) arms, legs, and head is also investigated. The MI-DARE protocol further prolongs the network lifetime by minimizing the number of transmissions. Simulation results show that the proposed techniques outperform contemporary schemes in terms of the selected performance metrics. © 2016, Javaid et al

Critical data-based incremental cooperative communication for wireless body area network

Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs) are single-hop network systems, where sensors gather the body’s vital signs and send them directly to master nodes (MNs). The sensors are distributed in or on the body. Therefore, body posture, clothing, muscle movement, body temperature, and climatic conditions generally influence the quality of the wireless link between sensors and the destination. Hence, in some cases, single hop transmission (‘direct transmission’) is not sufficient to deliver the signals to the destination. Therefore, we propose an emergency-based cooperative communication protocol for WBAN, named Critical Data-based Incremental Cooperative Communication (CD-ICC), based on the IEEE 802.15.6 CSMA standard but assuming a lognormal shadowing channel model. In this paper, a complete study of a system model is inspected in the terms of the channel path loss, the successful transmission probability, and the outage probability. Then a mathematical model is derived for the proposed protocol, end-to-end delay, duty cycle, and average power consumption. A new back-off time is proposed within CD-ICC, which ensures the best relays cooperate in a distributed manner. The design objective of the CD-ICC is to reduce the end-to-end delay, the duty cycle, and the average power transmission. The simulation and numerical results presented here show that, under general conditions, CD-ICC can enhance network performance compared to direct transmission mode (DTM) IEEE 802.15.6 CSMA and benchmarking. To this end, we have shown that the power saving when using CD-ICC is 37.5% with respect to DTM IEEE 802.15.6 CSMA and 10% with respect to MI-ICC

Green Computing for Wireless Body Area Networks: Energy Efficient Link Aware Medical Data Dissemination Approach

Recent technological advancement- in wireless communication has invented Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs), a cutting edge technology in healthcare applications. WBANs interconnect with intelligent and miniaturized biomedical sensor nodes placed on human body to un-attendant monitoring of physiological parameter of the patient. These sensors are equipped with limited resources in terms of computation, storage and battery power. The data communication in WBANs is a resource hungry process especially in terms of energy. One of the most significant challenges in this network is to design energy aware next-hop link selection framework. Towards this end, this paper presents a Green computing framework for WBANs focusing on Energy efficient Link aware approach (G-WEL). Firstly, a link efficiency oriented network model is presented considering beaconing information and network initialization process. Secondly, a path cost calculation model is derived focusing on energy aware link efficiency. A complete operational framework G-WEL is developed considering energy aware next hop link selection by utilizing the network and path cost model. The comparative performance evaluation attests the energy oriented benefit of the proposed framework as compared to the state-of-the-art techniques. It reveals a significant enhancement in body area networking in terms of various energy oriented metrics under medical environments

Towards Reliable and Energy-Efficient Incremental Cooperative Communication for Wireless Body Area Networks

In this study, we analyse incremental cooperative communication for wireless body area networks (WBANs) with different numbers of relays. Energy efficiency (EE) and the packet error rate (PER) are investigated for different schemes. We propose a new cooperative communication scheme with three-stage relaying and compare it to existing schemes. Our proposed scheme provides reliable communication with less PER at the cost of surplus energy consumption. Analytical expressions for the EE of the proposed three-stage cooperative communication scheme are also derived, taking into account the effect of PER. Later on, the proposed three-stage incremental cooperation is implemented in a network layer protocol; enhanced incremental cooperative critical data transmission in emergencies for static WBANs (EInCo-CEStat). Extensive simulations are conducted to validate the proposed scheme. Results of incremental relay-based cooperative communication protocols are compared to two existing cooperative routing protocols: cooperative critical data transmission in emergencies for static WBANs (Co-CEStat) and InCo-CEStat. It is observed from the simulation results that incremental relay-based cooperation is more energy efficient than the existing conventional cooperation protocol, Co-CEStat. The results also reveal that EInCo-CEStat proves to be more reliable with less PER and higher throughput than both of the counterpart protocols. However, InCo-CEStat has less throughput with a greater stability period and network lifetime. Due to the availability of more redundant links, EInCo-CEStat achieves a reduced packet drop rate at the cost of increased energy consumption

Towards Reliable and Energy-Efficient Incremental Cooperative Communication for Wireless Body Area Networks

Abstract: In this study, we analyse incremental cooperative communication for wireless body areanetworks (WBANs) with different numbers of relays. Energy efficiency (EE) and the packet error rate(PER) are investigated for different schemes. We propose a new cooperative communication schemewith three-stage relaying and compare it to existing schemes. Our proposed scheme provides reliablecommunication with less PER at the cost of surplus energy consumption. Analytical expressions forthe EE of the proposed three-stage cooperative communication scheme are also derived, takinginto account the effect of PER. Later on, the proposed three-stage incremental cooperation isimplemented in a network layer protocol; enhanced incremental cooperative critical data transmissionin emergencies for static WBANs (EInCo-CEStat). Extensive simulations are conducted to validatethe proposed scheme. Results of incremental relay-based cooperative communication protocols arecompared to two existing cooperative routing protocols: cooperative critical data transmission inemergencies for static WBANs (Co-CEStat) and InCo-CEStat. It is observed from the simulation resultsthat incremental relay-based cooperation is more energy efficient than the existing conventionalcooperation protocol, Co-CEStat. The results also reveal that EInCo-CEStat proves to be more reliablewith less PER and higher throughput than both of the counterpart protocols. However, InCo-CEStathas less throughput with a greater stability period and network lifetime. Due to the availability ofmore redundant links, EInCo-CEStat achieves a reduced packet drop rate at the cost of increasedenergy consumption

Modelling, analysis and design of MAC and routing protocols for wireless body area sensor networks.

The main contribution of the thesis is to provide modeling, analysis, and design for Medium Access Control (MAC) and link-quality based routing protocols of Wireless Body Area Sensor Networks (WBASNs) for remote patient monitoring applications by considering saturated and un-saturated traffic scenarios. The design of these protocols has considered the stringent Quality of Service (QoS) requirements of patient monitoring systems. Moreover, the thesis also provides intelligent routing metrics for packet forwarding mechanisms while considering the integration of WBASNs with the Internet of Things (IoTs). First, we present the numerical modeling of the slotted Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA) for the IEEE 802.15.4 and IEEE 802.15.6 standards. By using this modelling, we proposed a MAC layer mechanism called Delay, Reliability and Throughput (DRT) profile for the IEEE 802.15.4 and IEEE 802.15.6, which jointly optimize the QoS in terms of limited delay, reliability, efficient channel access and throughput by considering the requirements of patient monitoring system under different frequency bands including 420 MHz, 868 MHz and 2.4 GHz. Second, we proposed a duty-cycle based energy efficient adaptive MAC layer mechanism called Tele-Medicine Protocol (TMP) by considering the limited delay and reliability for patient monitoring systems. The proposed energy efficient protocol is designed by combining two optimizations methods: MAC layer parameter tuning and duty cycle-based optimization. The duty cycle is adjusted by using three factors: offered network traffic load, DRT profile and superframe duration. Third, a frame aggregation scheme called Aggregated-MAC Protocol Data Unit (A- MPDU) is proposed for the IEEE 802.15.4. A-MPDU provides high throughput and efficient channel access mechanism for periodic data transmission by considering the specified QoS requirements of the critical patient monitoring systems. To implement the scheme accurately, we developed a traffic pattern analysis to understand the requirements of the sensor nodes in patient monitoring systems. Later, we mapped the requirements on the existing MAC to find the performance gap. Fourth, empirical reliability assessment is done to validate the wireless channel characteristics of the low-power radios for successful deployment of WBASNs/IoTs based link quality routing protocols. A Test-bed is designed to perform the empirical experiments for the identification of the actual link quality estimation for different hospital environments. For evaluation of the test-bed, we considered parameters including Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI), Link Quality Indicator (LQI), packet reception and packet error rate. Finally, there is no standard under Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) which provides the integration of the IEEE 802.15.6 with IPv6 networks so that WBASNs could become part of IoTs. For this, an IETF draft is proposed which highlights the problem statement and solution for this integration. The discussion is provided in Appendix B