Improving 6TiSCH Reliability and Latency with Simultaneous Multi-Band Operation

Abstract: The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) group "IPv6 over the TSCH mode of IEEE 802.15.4e" (6TiSCH) introduced a protocol, utilizing Time-Slotted Channel Hopping (TSCH) from IEEE802.15.4e due to its high reliability and time-deterministic characteristic, that achieves industrial performance requirements while offering the benefits of IP connectivity. This work proposes the addition of a second radio interface in 6TiSCH devices to operate a parallel network in sub-GHz, introducing transmit diversity while benefiting from decreased path-loss and reduced interference. Simulation results show an improvement of 25% in Packet Delivery Ratio (PDR) and closely to 30% in latency in different 6TiSCH networks scenarios.