Two-Stage Coordination Multi-Radio Multi-Channel MAC Protocol for Wireless Mesh Networks

Abstract

Within the wireless mesh network, a bottleneck problem arises as the number of concurrent traffic flows (NCTF) increases over a single common control channel, as it is for most conventional networks. To alleviate this problem, this paper proposes a two-stage coordination multi-radio multi-channel MAC (TSC-M2MAC) protocol that designates all available channels as both control channels and data channels in a time division manner through a two-stage coordination. At the first stage, a load balancing breadth-first-search-based vertex coloring algorithm for multi-radio conflict graph is proposed to intelligently allocate multiple control channels. At the second stage, a REQ/ACK/RES mechanism is proposed to realize dynamical channel allocation for data transmission. At this stage, the Channel-and-Radio Utilization Structure (CRUS) maintained by each node is able to alleviate the hidden nodes problem; also, the proposed adaptive adjustment algorithm for the Channel Negotiation and Allocation (CNA) sub-interval is able to cope with the variation of NCTF. In addition, we design a power saving mechanism for the TSC-M2MAC to decrease its energy consumption. Simulation results show that the proposed protocol is able to achieve higher throughput and lower end-to-end packet delay than conventional schemes. They also show that the TSC-M2MAC can achieve load balancing, save energy, and remain stable when the network becomes saturated.