Method and device for time synchronization in a TDMA multi-hop wireless network

• US 20090323669A1
• Filed: 06/25/2009
• Published: 12/31/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 06/25/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: InterDigital CE Patent Holdings SAS (InterDigital, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Thomson Licensing (Vantiva SA)
• Inventors: Koutsonikolas, Dimitrios, Lundgren, Henrik, Salonidis, Theodoros
• Granted Patent: US 8,305,954 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/350
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 3/0655 using timestamps
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 48/08 Access restriction or access information delivery, e.g. discovery data delivery signalling during connection H04W76/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 56/001 Synchronization between nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/0446 Resources in time domain, e.g. slots or frames

Abstract

The invention concerns a method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA (“Time Division Multiple Access”) communication network comprising a plurality of nodes, among which some called time reference (TR) nodes are synchronized to a common time reference through a predetermined out-of-band synchronization mechanism, other nodes being called non-TR nodes, each node comprising an internal clock, characterized in that it comprises the steps of:

• • transmitting, at the level of at least one of said TR nodes, a broadcast beacon packet during a given time slot of sub-frames, each sub-frame comprising a plurality of time slots;
  • propagating among the remaining nodes said beacon packet using the slotted structure of the TDMA protocol, each node being pre-assigned a conflict-free time slot in a sub-frame to broadcast said beacon packet received from another node in a previous slot of said sub-frame; and
  • updating in at least two of said non-TR nodes the internal clock based on an updated offset estimate, upon reception of said beacon packet.

The invention also concerns a communication device in a TDMA communication network.

Claims

1. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA (“

Time Division Multiple Access”

) communication network comprising a plurality of nodes, among which some called time reference (TR) nodes are synchronized to a common time reference through a predetermined out-of-band synchronization mechanism, other nodes being called non-TR nodes, each node comprising an internal clock, wherein that it comprises the steps of;

transmitting, at the level of at least one of said TR nodes, a broadcast beacon packet during a given time slot of sub-frames, each sub-frame comprising a plurality of time slots;

propagating among the remaining nodes said beacon packet using the slotted structure of the TDMA protocol, each node being pre-assigned a conflict-free time slot in a sub-frame to broadcast said beacon packet received from another node in a previous slot of said sub-frame; and

updating in at least two of said non-TR nodes the internal clock based on an updated offset estimate, upon reception of said beacon packet.

2. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein it comprises a step, upon reception of said beacon packet by a node from another node, of estimating the time when node transmitted said beacon packet and a step of computing the offset between internal clock of node and internal clock of node.

3. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein said beacon packet comprises a timestamp with the current clock value of the TR node at the time when said beacon packet is transmitted by said TR node.

4. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein additional control information is disseminated from at least one of said TR nodes to at least two said non-TR nodes in said communication network.

5. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 4, wherein said additional control information is disseminated in said beacon packet.

6. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein said sub-frames are Synchronization Control Sub-Frames, which are part of control sub-frames.

7. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein in a given time slot, only one node transmits and the remaining nodes are in “

receive”

mode.

8. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein each time slot of said sub-frame is assigned to a node to transmit or propagate said beacon packet through said communication network.

9. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 8, wherein, when a node is assigned to transmit during a predetermined time slot of said sub-frame, at least one of its neighbor node has been assigned to transmit in the previous time slot.

10. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein it comprises steps of maintaining and updating a look-up table by at least one node, said look-up table being used to determine a value depending on the data rate value in said beacon packet.

11. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 10, wherein said value is equal to the sum of the three following values:

MAC transmission delay at the sender;

propagation delay ; and

MAC reception delay at the receiver.

12. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 2, wherein a step of providing a timestamp at a transmitting node is performed at a communication network protocol layer called MAC (Media Access Control) layer.

13. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein it comprises a step, performed at a communication network protocol layer called MAC (Media Access Control) layer, of receiving and decoding said beacon packet.

14. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 1, wherein at least two sub-frames are associated with at least one channel number and at least one time index within the sub-frame, and in that, at time index, nodes that belong to a given group of nodes switch to said channel and perform at least one synchronization step.

15. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 14, wherein there are two channel numbers and one time index, and one synchronization step is performed on each of the two channels at time index.

16. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 14, wherein there is one single channel number and two distinct time indexes, and two synchronization steps are performed on said single channel at the two distinct time indexes.

17. Method for synchronizing clocks of a set of nodes in a TDMA communication network according to claim 14, wherein said channel number designates a communication channel among a plurality of orthogonal communication channels.