Exploiting Short MAC Superframe Cycles for Fast Bit Synchronization in IEEE 802.15.4 UWB-IR

Ultra-Wideband Impulse Radio is a promising technology for industrial automation applications due to its inherent multipath robustness and coexistence features. The ultra-wideband impulse radio PHY standardized in IEEE 802.15.4, however, is optimized for low duty cycles and not optimized for real-time communication. Especially the long preambles that are needed for synchronization cause a large overhead that might not be necessary in systems with a high duty cycle. We propose an efficient synchronization scheme, which is a cross-layer improvement and which combines this PHY layer with a MAC layer for wireless real-time communication in low latency deterministic networks based on draft IEEE 802.15.4e. This scheme splits synchronization into a network-wide frame synchronization via a broadcast beacon with a standard preamble and bit-level synchronization using just very short preambles per data frame. To achieve this, we exploit the short communication cycles and the centralized communication flow common in factory automation networks. We present and discuss simulation results of our proposed scheme that verify its higher efficiency.