An energy-efficient MAC protocol for wireless sensor networks

Abstract

In this paper, an asynchronous energy-efficient MAC protocol, ASCEMAC, is proposed for wireless sensor networks. In ASCEMAC, by applying free-running method and fuzzy logic rescheduling scheme, time synchronization which is necessary in existing energy-efficient MAC protocols is not required any more. Moreover, we present a traffic-strength- and network-density-based model to determine essential algorithm parameters, such as power on/off duration, interval of schedule broadcast and super-time-slot size and order. Simulation results show that our algorithm can ensure the average successful transmission rate, decrease the data packet average waiting time, and reduce the average energy consumption. Therefore, network performance is improved and network lifetime is extended by using our algorithm.