STREAM-E: A Streamlined Resource Allocation in Multichannel MAC for DSME With Energy-Aware Extension for Constrained-IIoT

The industrial Internet of things (IIoT) relies heavily on real-time, energy-efficient, and reliable wireless communication. Although the IEEE 802.15.4-based medium access control (MAC) protocols, such as deterministic synchronous multichannel extension (DSME) enhances multichannel access for constrained IIoT environments, it lacks robust resource allocation mechanisms for guaranteed time slot (GTS) scheduling and adaptive channel assignment under quality of service (QoS) constraints. To address these limitations, we propose STREAM-E, a QoS- and energy-aware MAC protocol that enhances the performance of DSME MAC in dynamic industrial settings. STREAM-E integrates QoS-aware GTS scheduling based on traffic class and buffer occupancy, exponentially weighted moving average (EWMA)-based dynamic channel selection to reduce interference, and (iii) a genetic algorithm (GA)-based energy-aware mechanism to extend network lifetime during emergencies. We assessed STREAM-E through performance evaluation in a cluster-tree network and detailed cost analysis. The simulation results show that STREAM-E improves overall resource utilization by 9.23% compared to existing DSME-based MAC protocols. Moreover, it achieves 20.04% more energy efficiency during emergencies.