RESEARCH ARTICLE OpenWSN: A Standards-Based Low-Power Wireless Development Environment

The OpenWSN project is an open-source implementation of a fully standards-based protocol stack for capillary networks, rooted in the new IEEE802.15.4e Time Synchronized Channel Hopping standard. IEEE802.15.4e, coupled with Internet-of-Things standards, such as 6LoWPAN, RPL and CoAP, enables ultra-low power and highly reliable mesh networks which are fully integrated into the Internet. The resulting protocol stack will be cornerstone to the upcoming Machine-to-Machine revolution. This article gives an overview of the protocol stack, as well key integration details and the platforms and tools developed around it. The pure C OpenWSN stack was ported to four off-the-shelf platforms representative of hardware currently used, from older 16-bit micro-controller to state-of-the-art 32-bit Cortex-M architectures. The tools developed around the low-power mesh networks include visualization and debugging software, a simulator to mimic OpenWSN networks on a PC, and the environment needed to connect those networks to the Internet. Experimental results presented in this article include a network where motes operate at an average radio duty cycle well below 0.1 % and an average current draw of 68µA on off-the-shelf hardware. These ultra-low power requirements enable a range of applications, with motes perpetually powered by micro-scavenging devices. OpenWSN is, to the best of our knowledge, the first open-source implementation of the IEEE802.15.4e standard. Copyright c © 2013 John Wiley & Sons