Discrete-time queueing model of age of information with multiple information sources

Abstract

Information freshness in IoT-based status update systems has recently been studied through the Age of Information (AoI) and Peak AoI (PAoI) performance metrics. In this article, we study a discrete-time server arising in multisource IoT systems, which accepts incoming information packets from multiple information sources so as to be forwarded to a remote monitor for status update purposes. Under the assumption of Bernoulli information packet arrivals and a common general discrete phase-type service time distribution across all the sources, we numerically obtain the exact per-source distributions of AoI and PAoI in matrix-geometric form for three different queueing disciplines: 1) nonpreemptive bufferless; 2) preemptive bufferless; and 3) nonpreemptive single buffer with replacement. The proposed numerical algorithm employs the theory of discrete-time Markov chains of quasi-birth-death type and is matrix analytical. Numerical examples are provided to validate the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed queueing model. We also present a numerical example on the optimum choice of the Bernoulli parameters in a practical IoT system with two sources with diverse AoI requirements.