A Novel Skew Estimation Scheme for Time Synchronization in Wireless Networks

Time synchronization in wireless networks is very important not only for basic communication, but also for the ability of ranging and tracking. This paper proposes a novel clock skew estimation scheme to achieve energyefficient time synchronization for wireless networks. By using recursive least squares estimators, we not only reduce the amount of data which should be stored locally in a table at each node, but also allow offset and skew compensations to be processed simultaneously. Our skew estimators can be easily integrated with traditional offset compensation schemes. The results of simulation and experiment show that the accuracy of time synchronization can be greatly improved through our skew compensation algorithm.