DV/DRP: A Content-Based Networking Protocol For Sensor Networks

An ideal sensor network would minimize communication by routing information only to those nodes requiring the information. We are exploring the use of a content-based network for this purpose, where messages containing sensor readings and associated metadata are relayed from source nodes to destination nodes based solely on the fact that the destination nodes have expressed interest in specific message content. This paper contributes a concrete protocol, called DV/DRP, that implements content-based networking for wireless sensor networks or other similarly constrained network configurations. DV/DRP augments a basic distance vector protocol to construct both primary and alternate routes. DV/DRP also features a new content-based forwarding technique called dynamic receiver partitioning. DV/DRP makes minimal assumptions on the underlying MAC layer. Notably, it uses only a primitive local broadcast, does not require reliability of the link layer nor the use of acknowledgments, and explicitly handles asymmetric links. We present simulations showing that the protocol scales to large networks while minimizing the resource consumption of individual nodes. We also show that the protocol is robust with respect to transient and permanent node failures, as well as asymmetries in wireless links. Finally, to demonstrate that DV/DRP is suitable for memory-constrained sensor networks, we discuss a preliminary implementation. c © 2005–2006 Cyrus P. Hall, Antonio Carzaniga, and Alexander L. Wolf