Packet-Level Index Modulation for LoRaWAN

The long range wide area network (LoRaWAN) is one of the enabling technologies for low power wide area (LPWA) networks. In LoRaWAN, a node transmits its packet to a gateway (GW) in an autonomous and decentralized manner. The quantity of data that can be transmitted by each node is limited by the duty cycle (DC). Furthermore, it is not easy for the nodes to perform sophisticated techniques for increasing the data quantity due to their limited functionality, especially when the nodes are battery-powered. If the network size increases, packet collision may occur more frequently. Since the packet transmission drains the LoRaWAN nodes’ battery, the packet collision results in a waste of limited power. Thus, it is necessary to develop a simple but effective transmission strategy that efficiently utilizes limited battery at each LoRaWAN node. This study proposes packet-level index modulation (PLIM), which is suitable for such LPWA networks. PLIM takes advantage of the sparse data packet transmission in time and the selection of a frequency channel among multiple ones by each node. A time slot and frequency channel combination is selected, i.e., the index, to increase the data quantity. For long-range communication, it is necessary to use a higher spreading factor (SF) in LoRaWAN, which results in a lower data rate due to the DC. The proposed PLIM can compensate for such data rate loss by taking advantage of the sparse transmission in time. Numerical evaluation elucidates that the proposed PLIM can increase the data quantity of LoRaWAN system without requiring any modification in the specification. When the SF is 10, the proposed PLIM can increase the data quantity up to 32.5%, compared to the conventional LoRaWAN system.