Minimizing Age of Information in IEEE 802.15.6 Time-Slotted Wireless Systems through Maximizing Slot Utilization Ratio

Abstract

With the growing need to ensure data freshness in time-sensitive applications, the Age of Information (AoI) has become a critical performance metric, particularly in IEEE 802.15.6 time-slotted wireless systems. In these systems, each data sample carries significant informational value, making it critical to maintain the freshness of all collected samples without loss. However, limited time and bandwidth resources pose a significant challenge, underscoring the importance of maximizing resource utilization. To address this issue, we propose an on-demand burst transmission mechanism that combines buffer-aware scheduling with block-based data transmission. This hybrid approach eliminates idle slots and reduces acknowledgment overhead, thereby improving slot efficiency and significantly lowering the AoI of all sampled data under tight resource constraints. To further enhance the robustness of on-demand burst transmissions in lossy wireless environments, we incorporate predictive channel awareness into the burst scheduling process, enabling adaptive and reliable transmission decisions. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm significantly outperforms conventional AoI schedulers, especially in resource-constrained and dynamically varying network conditions.