Hierarchical and low‐power IPv6 address configuration for wireless sensor networks

The paper proposes a hierarchical and low‐power IPv6‐address configuration scheme for wireless sensor networks based on the cluster‐tree architecture. In the scheme, a wireless sensor network is divided into multiple clusters and the generation algorithm of a cluster is proposed. A cluster‐tree architecture for wireless sensor networks is presented and a layered IPv6 address format for a cluster head and a cluster member is created. The stateless address configuration strategy and the stateful address configuration strategy are effectively combined to develop the IPv6 address configuration scheme. In the scheme, the duplicate address detection of the IPv6 address assigned for a cluster member is performed in the cluster where the cluster member locates, and the IPv6 address configuration for the cluster members in the different clusters can be carried out at the same time. The paper also addresses the mobility of sensor nodes and their failure. From the theoretical and simulative perspectives, the paper analyzes the performance parameters, including duplicate address detection cost, address configuration cost and address configuration delay time, of the proposed scheme, Strong DAD and MANETConf. Analytical and simulative results show that the performance of the proposed scheme is better. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.