18ECRB0- ADHOC AND SENSOR NETWORKS

ASSIGNMENT- 3
CROSS LAYER DESIGN FOR WSN

SUBMITTED BY:
TEAM - 8
BHARATH KUMAR K - 18D020
LOGESHWAR K B - 18D057
MUKESH RAM S - 18D065
SHIBISH K T P - 18D094
 CROSS LAYER DESIGN FOR WSN
Introduction:
• Layering systems are the norm in the design of communication protocol
stacks.
• However, wireless systems are not always suited to the common layered
protocol stack architecture.
• For example, in a layered architecture using the Transmission Control
Protocol (TCP), a failed packet is considered a sign of congestion, as
opposed to simply a lost or corrupted packet which is the case in wireless
systems.
• For sensor networks, and smart routing specifically, given the need to
conserve sensor energy and maximize application performance, cooperation
between several layers in the protocol stack is crucial.
• This can only be achieved in a cross-layer architecture. Cross-layer design
ensures that the route that best meets both performance and energy
requirements can be determined.
 Various Cross-Layer Design Protocols 

Figure 1

• Creation of new interfaces for information flow between non-adjacent layers

(Figure 1a to c).
• Merging of adjacent layers for joint functionality and reduced overhead (Figure
1d).
• Design coupling between layers, i.e. one layer assumes information arriving from
another (Figure 1e).
• Vertical calibration between layers (Figure 1f).
Cross layer design for WSN

• In next-generation wireless sensor networks (WSNs), a number of these

protocols may be used.
• For example, upward information flow (Figure 1a) may be used to provide the
application layer with available routes from the network layer, channel
availability from the link layer and remaining energy information from the
physical (PHY) layer.
• Furthermore, downward information flow (Figure 1b) or back-and-forth
information flow (Figure 1c) may be used between the application layer and
the PHY layer.
• For example, the application layer may inform the PHY layer of transmission
parameters such as transmit power and operating frequency to use during
transmission.
Cross layer design using Direct Signaling
• The design of a cross-layer optimization algorithm for WSNs that consider
both performance and energy factors requires efficient communication
between protocol stack layers such as the PHY, link, network and application
layers.
• Direct signaling between application layers reduces latency in the
communication between multiple layers and is crucial in the design of cross-
layer optimization algorithms.
• The goal of direct signaling is to exchange information between important
protocol layers for smart routing.
• This ensures that the required information to perform cross-layer
optimization is retrieved, and allocation decisions are sent, with minimal
delay.
•  Direct signaling enables the interactions with minimal delay for optimized
and timely responses in the distributed network.
CLD with separate Cross-Layer Agent

• Cross Layer agent consist of two components one is The Cross-Layer

interaction interface and other is the cross-layer data module as shown in Fig.
2.
• In the Cross-Layer interaction interface, there are further 3 interfaces having
Network sub-interface, MAC sub-interface and physical sub-interface which
works as sandwitch between protocol stack and cross layer agent.
• Each sub-layer has predefined method to change the protocol and make
necessary changes like the state of the channel, routing tables, the state of the
battery, etc. Cross layer data module aid in cross-layer adaptation and
optimization.
• It updates the data as described earlier with help of sub-interfaces.
 Figure 2- Cross Layer Agent

• This kind of coordination between sub-layers helps the network layer to

make the decision with the help of physical and MAC layer and network
layer give instruction to MAC and physical layer.
• This inter-layer communication makes the stack to adapt according to the
condition that help in the optimization of energy consumption.
CLD with cognitive controllers
• There are 2 types of flow in the protocol stack – data flow in the vertical
direction and control flow in the horizontal direction.
• Data flow contains the status of the topology, performance parameters,
fault KPIs and implementation specific data.
• On the other hand, control flow which contains the current state of the
stack flows to the controller.

Figure 3- Controller design

• Data from all the layers is stored in controller as a separate entity which fetch
current as well as past values of the stack.
• Once the data has been collected in the controller, it changes the control points.
• The selection of information to give to the controller is an essential structure
thought. System stack segment has the input points of control and the output
points of status data.
• Input control ports makes the controller to change the characteristics of the
behaviour of the component by the minor changes in delays and timeouts or
complex changes like control flow contains algorithm used, data formats, and
protocol structure like length of the message and link layer handshake structure.
• Controller makes the decision based on stack’s present state. Current state in the
terms of what is the traffic load in the stack, how many links with the nodes, how
many packets are dropped in the past.
• After taking the decision it instruct the MAC layer via control port.
Future work in CLD for WSN

• Future research work should be to make the cross-layer designs stronger and
more reliable as in WSNs nodes are minute and does not have much
computation power to support the complex algorithms like data parsing and
fragmentation of cross layer design.
• Cross layer design might be highly successful in other networks, but with
high cost and challenges in deployment especially for the dense nature of
sensor nodes it requires further development.
• For coordination between the layers, CLD is required message flow between
layers, so more signaling messages. This leads to increased power, delay and
memory usage.
• So, these problems should be mitigated for best performance in WSNs.
THANK YOU