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. 2018 Jul 25;18(8):2409.
doi: 10.3390/s18082409.

The Bluetooth Mesh Standard: An Overview and Experimental Evaluation

Mathias Baert  1 , Jen Rossey  2 , Adnan Shahid  3 , Jeroen Hoebeke  4
Affiliations

The Bluetooth Mesh Standard: An Overview and Experimental Evaluation

Mathias Baert et al. Sensors (Basel). .

Abstract

Mesh networks enable a many-to-many relation between nodes, which means that each node in the network can communicate with every other node using multi-hop communication and path diversity. As it enables the fast roll-out of sensor and actuator networks, it is an important aspect within the Internet of Things (IoT). Utilizing Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) as an underlying technology to implement such mesh networks has gained a lot of interest in recent years. The result was a variety of BLE meshing solutions that were not interoperable because of the lack of a common standard. This has changed recently with the advent of the Bluetooth Mesh standard. However, a detailed overview of how this standard operates, performs and how it tackles other issues concerning BLE mesh networking is missing. Therefore, this paper investigates this new technology thoroughly and evaluates its performance by means of three approaches, namely an experimental evaluation, a statistical approach and a graph-based simulation model, which can be used as the basis for future research. Apart from showing that consistent results are achieved by means of all three approaches, we also identify possible drawbacks and open issues that need to be dealt with.

Keywords: BLE; Bluetooth Mesh; IoT; interoperability; performance; round-trip-time; scalability.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Distribution of channels for BLE communication.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Illustration of BLE advertising and scanning modes [6].
Figure 3
Figure 3
Illustration of BLE connection oriented mode [6].
Figure 4
Figure 4
Conceptual definition of the Bluetooth Mesh Standard through a publish/subscribe model [5].
Figure 5
Figure 5
An example of each optional feature within the Bluetooth Mesh standard.
Figure 6
Figure 6
The layered architecture of the Bluetooth Mesh Standard [5].
Figure 7
Figure 7
An example of the underlying wireless communication between two nodes in a Bluetooth Mesh network.
Figure 8
Figure 8
Distribution of the density function for the [0,B+2Q] interval.
Figure 9
Figure 9
The OfficeLab plan on our floor and a closer look at one of the NUCs.
Figure 10
Figure 10
The data collection scheme of the OfficeLab measurement campaign.
Figure 11
Figure 11
The topology used to conduct the multi-neighbors measurement.
Figure 12
Figure 12
Two hop communication measurements with a varying amount of neighbors.
Figure 13
Figure 13
Multi-hop communication with a varying amount of hops.
Figure 14
Figure 14
Multi hop communication measurements with a varying amount of hops.
Figure 15
Figure 15
Time distribution for the average round trip time of multi-hop communication in Bluetooth Mesh networks.
Figure 16
Figure 16
Round trip time of a Bluetooth Mesh network with a varying amount of BLE beacons.
Figure 17
Figure 17
Distribution of the round trip time with a varying amount of BLE beacons.
Figure 18
Figure 18
The Bluetooth Mesh network used to conduct experiments.
Figure 19
Figure 19
Visualization of a measurement using a physical throughput of 1 Mbps.
Figure 20
Figure 20
Visualization of a measurement using a physical throughput of 2 Mbps.
Figure 21
Figure 21
Power density over frequency for 1 Mbps and 2 Mbps.
Figure 22
Figure 22
Two snapshots of the mesh network used to conduct the experiments with three neighbors.
Figure 23
Figure 23
Comparison for the average round trip time using a varying amount of neighbors.
Figure 24
Figure 24
Comparison for the average round trip time using a varying amount of hops.
Figure 25
Figure 25
Distribution of the average round trip time for all the snapshots, using a varying amount of neighbors.
Figure 26
Figure 26
Distribution of the average round trip time for all the snapshots, using a varying amount of hops.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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