A 2-Colorable DODAG Structured Hybrid Mode of Operations Architecture for RPL Protocol to Reduce Communication Overhead

The Routing Protocol for low-power and lossy Networks (RPL) is the established standard for packet-level communications in the Internet of Things (IoT). The efficiency of point-to-point (P2P) communications in RPL relies on the mode of operation employed by the network nodes. Hybrid modes of operation (MOP) have gained attention as they combine the advantages of both standard non-storing and storing operation modes. However, existing hybrid MOPs have struggled to achieve a balance between reduced communication overhead and storage overhead. To address this, we propose the application of the 2-colorable graph property to enable a hybrid mode of operation among IoT network nodes. By mapping the two-colorable property to the standard MOPs, we conduct experiments comparing the proposed hybrid MOP with existing approaches. Results demonstrate that our proposed hybrid MOP achieves a significant balance between storing and non-storing nodes, while also exhibiting improved average path length compared to existing hybrid MOPs. This research contributes to optimizing P2P communications in RPL-based IoT networks and highlights the potential benefits of utilizing the 2-colorable graph property in achieving an efficient hybrid mode of operation.