Simulation and performance evaluation of ZigBee for Wireless Sensor Networks having multiple events occurring simultaneously at a time

Abstract

ZigBee is an emerging standard for Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs). It targets low distance, low data rate, low power consumption and low cost applications. According to standard nomenclature, it implements a Low Rate-Wireless Personal Area Network (LR-WPAN). ZigBee defines upper layers (network and application) of the ISO protocol reference model. On the contrary, in regards to the physical and data link ones, it relies over another standard, the well accepted IEEE802.15.4, which offers a gross transfer rate of 250 kbps in the 2.4 GHz ISM unlicensed band. Although ZigBee is designed for event-based applications, ZigBee is designed as a low-cost, low-power, low-data rate wireless mesh technology. There are many wireless sensor networks in which it is required to send information to the pan coordinator continuously and simultaneously. Our purpose here in this paper is to test zigbee for such kind of networks where multiple events take place simultaneously. Also we want to see the effect of increasing the number of events in a scenario, so that we can find out its effect. © 2010 American Institute of Physics.