Reliable data transport and congestion control in wireless sensor networks

Reliable data delivery and congestion control are two fundamental transport layer functions. Due to the specific characteristics of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), traditional transport layer protocols (e.g. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and User Datagram Protocol (UDP)) that are widely used in the Internet may not be suitable for WSNs. In this paper, the characteristics of WSNs are reviewed and the requirements and challenges of reliable data transport over WSNs are presented. The issues with applying traditional transport protocols over WSNs are discussed. We then survey recent research progress in developing suitable transport protocols for WSNs. The proposed reliable data transport and congestion control protocols for WSNs are reviewed and summarised. Finally, we describe some future research directions of transport protocol in WSNs.