Analysis and Evaluation of a New MAC Protocol for Broadband Wireless Access

Abstract

Broadband wireless access (BWA) systems offer a solution for broadband access and high data rate transmission of multimedia services with distinct quality-of-service (QoS) requirements through a wireless medium, IEEE 802.16 standard specifies the PHY and MAC layers for BWA systems. However, in spite of including the possibility for QoS support, the standard does not define how to schedule different types of traffic. This article propose a new MAC protocol for BWA systems that incorporates a traffic scheduling mechanism based on messages and/or stations priorities. An analytical model to evaluate the performance of the proposed protocol is also developed and results obtained for the messages waiting times of different traffic classes are presented.