Journals Proceedings

Abstract

Low-power wireless personal area network (LoWPAN) consists of large number of resource constraint devices connected over a wireless link with the aim of gathering real time information and transmitting it to desired application and vice versa. This requires transmission of IPv6 packets over Low-power wireless personal area network and is called 6LoWPAN. The large sized headers like IPv6, TCP, and UDP consume most of the packet space leaving only 28 bytes for actual payload. MTU of 802.15.4(IEEE standard for wireless network) is only 127 bytes much less as compare to IPv6 packet which is of 1280 bytes. Hence Header compression and fragmentation becomes a necessity in 6LoWPAN so as to provide reasonable number of bits for payload. This paper depicts 6LoWPAN protocol stack and various header compression techniques for compressing IPv6 header. It also shows comparison among various techniques on the basis of total number of bits needed in compressed IPv6 header under various scenarios.