Handoff Algorithms for Industrial Mobile Wireless Sensor Networks

The management of mobility in industrial wireless sensor networks (WSN) is especially challenging because of the ad-hoc nature of the networks. To support the mobility of the user while maintaining at the same time its connectivity, the supporting handoff mechanisms need to be carefully considered. Two of the main phases of a handoff are the triggering and the decision process. In this paper, we consider two triggering options, the RSSI and the Link Loss. In addition, we propose a new handoff decision scheme named Burst Loss Algorithm (BLA) compared with the traditional RSSI-based decision option. We evaluate the four resulting combinations of the triggering and handoff options with respect to the end-to-end packet loss and the total power consumption, and at the same time we determine the effectiveness of each solution by measuring and relating the number of handoff triggers and the actual handoffs performed. The results show that a combination of handoff decisions outperforms any single-based handoff decision.