LoRaWAN Relay Pairing for Remote IoT Battery Life
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Long-range wireless networks with battery-operated IoT devices experience uneven battery consumption, leading to early failures and increased maintenance costs due to varying energy requirements for data transmission, especially for devices farther from the gateway, resulting in disparate battery lifetimes.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a transmission-energy load-balancing mechanism where remote end devices share battery energy by forwarding data through closer end devices, optimizing data rate configurations and path lengths to reduce energy consumption, and using an analysis server to identify and configure pairs for energy sharing.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If remote end devices transmit data directly to the gateway, then data transmission is achieved, but battery consumption is high and battery lifetime is short
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces intermediate end devices that act as relays between remote end devices and the gateway. These intermediary devices receive data from remote devices and forward it to the gateway, reducing the transmission distance and energy consumption for remote devices while maintaining network connectivity.
Solution Approach 2:
The direct transmission path from remote end devices to the gateway is segmented into multiple hops through intermediate devices. This segmentation allows the transmission journey to be divided into shorter segments, reducing the energy burden on individual remote devices.
2Area of stationary object
If data is transmitted over long distances to the gateway, then wide area coverage is achieved, but transmission energy requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
Intermediate end devices serve as mediators that receive data from remote devices and forward it to the gateway. This multi-hop approach allows wide area coverage to be achieved while keeping individual transmission power requirements low, as each device only transmits over short distances.
3Speed
If higher data rates are used for transmission, then data transmission speed is improved, but energy consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies partial action by using higher data rates only for short-distance transmissions between nearby end devices, while relying on multiple hops for the remaining distance. This allows the benefits of high data rates to be utilized where they are most effective (short ranges) without the full energy penalty over long distances.
Data Source
AI summary
A long-range wireless network extends the battery life of the most remote end devices by forming pairs with a relayer end device that relays data from the remote end device to a gateway. The battery life of the relayer is reduced to extend the battery life of the remote end device. An analysis server selects pairs of end devices that have a difference in battery levels above a threshold, and require less transmission energy from the remote end device to the relayer than to the gateway. Energy or path losses are estimated based on geographic locations of end devices and terrain or obstacles. Redundant pairs from a remote end device are eliminated by selecting the relayer requiring the lowest transmission energy. A new configuration is sent to the remote end device. New configurations with higher Spreading Factors (SF) compensate for pairs with larger path losses to the relayer.