Loop-Free Routing in Low-Power and Lossy Networks

IPv6 based Low-Power and Lossy Networks (LLNs) are emerging. Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) has developed an IPv6 Routing Protocol for LLNs (RPL), which is widely considered as a feasible routing protocol for LLNs. However, routing loops and lack of a loop-free local route repair mechanism are two major open issues to be addressed in RPL. Based on the framework of RPL, this paper proposes a Loop-Free Routing Protocol for LLNs (LRPL). We provide an innovative rank computation method and a loop-free local route repair mechanism to eliminate routing loops in RPL. Simulation results show that the proposed LRPL performs much better than conventional routing protocols in terms of packet delivery rate, end-to-end packet delay, and routing overhead. International Conference on Sensor Technologies and Applications (SENSORCOMM) This work may not be copied or reproduced in whole or in part for any commercial purpose. Permission to copy in whole or in part without payment of fee is granted for nonprofit educational and research purposes provided that all such whole or partial copies include the following: a notice that such copying is by permission of Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc.; an acknowledgment of the authors and individual contributions to the work; and all applicable portions of the copyright notice. Copying, reproduction, or republishing for any other purpose shall require a license with payment of fee to Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc. All rights reserved. Copyright c ©Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories, Inc., 2012 201 Broadway, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139