40120140503011

International Journal of Electronics and Communication Engineering & Technology (IJECET), ISSN 0976 –
6464(Print), ISSN 0976 – 6472(Online), Volume 5, Issue 3, March (2014), pp. 79-93 © IAEME
79
MAC PROTOCOL BASED LOW ENERGY OPERATIONS IN WIRELESS
SENSOR NETWORKS
Rohit D. Gawade1
, Dr. S. L. Nalbalwar2
1,2
Department of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering,
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University,
Lonere, Raigad, Maharashtra, India
ABSTRACT
Wireless sensor network is a collection of autonomous, spatially distributed sensor nodes
which work together to form a network to monitor environmental conditions such as temperature,
pressure, humidity etc. Due to advancement in various technologies like radio, battery and operating
systems in sensor nodes, WSN have become an emerging field. For researchers, WSN has become an
active area of research due to their wide range of applications in several fields such as agriculture,
transportation, military etc. After deployment in remote areas, sensor nodes are generally unattended
and have to work with their limited energy resources. Recent advances in WSN have lead to the
development of new protocols designed for various applications where energy efficiency is an
essential consideration. In WSNs communication among various nodes is achieved by means of
unique channel which can be accessed by a single node. To provide shared access of channel among
sensor nodes, a medium access control protocol is required to be established. In this paper we
provide a comprehensive survey of recent energy efficient medium access control protocols for
WSNs. This paper starts with an introduction of wireless sensor networks and discussion of good a
WSN-MAC protocol properties. This paper then describes several MAC protocols proposed for
sensor networks under two important categories which are schedule based and contention based. The
paper concludes with comparison among various MAC protocols regarding various characteristics
under each category
Keywords: Wireless Sensor Networks, Medium Access Control, Schedule Based MAC Protocol,
Contention Based MAC Protocols, Energy Efficient.
I. INTRODUCTION
A wireless sensor network is used to monitor atmospheric conditions like temperature,
pressure, humidity by using various distributed sensors. Data from different sensors are transmitted
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through multiple hopes to the base station which is located at large distance from nodes. Today
wireless sensor networks are having many applications in the military, in agriculture, in
transportation, in manufacturing and in smart homes etc. A WSN is made up of nodes which ranges
from a few to several hundreds. One or several sensors are attached to each node. Each sensor
network node consists of several parts such as internal or external antenna for communication, sensor
module for sensor interfacing, digital processor for sensor data processing and a battery to provide
energy to node. Each sensor “views” environment. Different physical quantities from environment
are mapped into quantitative measurements by using sensors. Sensor nodes send their data to a
remotely placed base station. At that base station user can have access to that data [1].
It is very difficult, inefficient and infeasible for humans to monitor physical conditions in
harsh environments. Ability of a wireless sensor networks to operate in such atmospheric conditions
is the key advantage. In remote and dangerous area sensor nodes can be randomly placed by using
various means of transport e.g. sensors can be dropped from helicopters for monitoring physical
conditions. Sensor nodes get power from batteries. Battery lifetime is limited. When sensor nodes are
placed in remote and dangerous area, they may get damaged. As battery lifetime is limited and nodes
may get destroyed while placing, large number of sensors are needed to cover a wide area. Many
times hundreds or thousands of sensor nodes are required to monitor a given area. It is necessary to
design proper architecture and use better management strategies to operate such huge networks.
Nowdays wireless sensor network development process has become an advanced. Due to this earlier
wired networks are replaced by wireless sensor networks. WSNs are more beneficial than earlier
wired networks as they can be easily placed, their transmission range is more and they can be self
organised. These networks are having few drawbacks. Their communication bandwidth is less,
storage capacity is small, computational resources, node energy and hence network lifetime is
limited. There may be collision among data transmitted by different nodes. To avoid these
drawbacks, energy efficient protocols are needed to increase node energy, Media Access Control
protocols and routing protocols can be used to avoid collisions among data transmitted by different
nodes.
Sensors should be self organized and coordinated to perform the work necessary to support
required action. For successful completion of mission for which WSN nodes are placed,
communication which is efficient and network layer protocols should be crucially designed.
Neighbouring sensor nodes should be connected by communication links for data transfer over
multihop wireless sensor network. In wired network sensor nodes are communicated by guided
medium whereas in wireless network nodes are communicated by transmitted signal through air in
the form of electromagnetic signal. For better sharing of transmission medium by all wireless sensor
network nodes a medium access control protocol must be utilized.
This paper is designed to discuss the requirements of medium access control protocol for
WSN and to provide survey of the same. In section II background is given. Section III explains basic
requirements of media access control protocol. In section IV survey of different media access control
protocol used in shared medium is given.
II. BACKGROUND
A single channel is used for data transmission among different nodes in wireless sensor
networks, therefore a single node should transmit a data at a given time to avoid collision. So there is
a need of MAC protocols for accessing shared channel without collision. In open system
interconnections reference model, datalink layer is subdivided into two sublayers i.e. Logical Link
Control (higher) sublayer and Media Access Control (lower) sublayer. MAC protocols are provided
by lower sublayer (MAC) of datalink layer and higher sublayer (LLC) supports several MAC options.
Physical layer explains how physical devices should process for transmission and reception of bits.

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Physical layer handles transreception of bits and encoding and decoding of signals. Above physical
layer MAC sublayer is present. MAC sublayer converts data into frames, adds header field and
trailer field. At receiver it converts received frame into binary data and provides error detection and
correction.
Application
Presentation
Session
Transport
Network
Datalink
LLC Sublayer
MAC
Sublayer
Physical
Fig. 1. OSI reference model
Communicating nodes are spatially distributed which causes problems in designing effective
MAC protocols. It is necessary that each node should know which node can send its data at a given
time. For that purpose coordinating must be transmitted to all nodes. Communication channel itself is
needed for transmitting that information to all nodes. Such multi-access requirement of
communication channel causes access control protocol and overhead required to become more
complex. One node cannot get exact information about all other nodes in a network as nodes are
spatially separated and any information received by a node is as old as time required for that
information to travel through communication channel. Behavioural quality of a multiple access
control protocol is mainly dependant on accurate decisions and overhead required by it. Overhead
required should not necessarily reduced in order to increase accuracy of decisions made by MAC
protocols because decision accuracy may get degrade by reducing overhead. It is very difficult but
important to know the information used by MAC protocols. Different MAC protocols use range of
information starting from minimum amount to perfect. There are different types of information like
predetermined, dynamic global and local. Information common to all communicating nodes is known
as predetermined information. While protocol is working, some information is known to few nodes
involved in operation, such information is known as dynamic global information. Some information
is known to individual nodes which is known as local information. For different nodes to coordinate
efficiently and perfectly, predetermined and dynamic global information takes an important part. For
communication between different nodes required overhead can be reduced by using local
information but may degrade the accuracy of decisions made by protocol[2].
III. CHARACTERISTICS OF MAC PROTOCOLS
In a MAC layer, a data packet always takes some time before its successful transmission.
Such time is known as delay. Traffic in network and designing methods of MAC protocol causes
such delay. To meet quality of service requirements of some applications, it is necessary that
multiple access control protocols should support delay bound guarantees. A local message within a
node and global massage among all nodes in a network must be carefully scheduled to provide delay
boundaries which are guaranteed. Delay guarantees are of two types, Probabilistic delay guarantees
and deterministic delay guarantees. Probabilistic delay guarantees are given by probabilities and
variances. Whenever any massage is arrived, it undergoes different state transitions before it is again
transmitted. An ensured predictable number of such state transitions are specified by deterministic

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delay guarantees. Maximum length of access period is guaranteed by deterministic MAC techniques .
Many applications requires their task to be completed within specified time limit. In such
environment, deterministic MAC schemes are mainly required.
Communication network transmits massage at a specific rate which is known as throughput
which is also an objective of MAC protocol. Unit of throughput is messages per second or bits per
second. Fraction of the capacity of the channel used for data transmission is represented by
throughput. Whenever communication network has to transmit large amount of data throughput
increases initially. When traffic on network reaches certain threshold, the throughput continues to
increase or decrease depending on situation. MAC protocols should be designed such that it will
minimise massage delay and maximise the channel throughput.
MAC protocol should be reliable and least succeptible to errors which if occurred should
detect and mask them. They should have ability to restart and reconfigure network if communicating
nodes or links fail.
In WSN size of a network is variable and number of sensor nodes are large exceeding
thousands and millions of nodes. Independancy of the communication network on such high number
of nodes and variable network size for obtaining desired goals refers to scalability. In order to
achieve scalability, use of fixed network architecture should be avoided. Scalability can also be
achieved by making structure of communicating network hierarchical like forming clusters from
group of nodes and employing strategies which aggregate information from different sensors.
Traffic over a communication network always fluctuates such that it may exceed maximum
sustained load with respect to time. A MAC protocol should be able to handle such fluctuations in
traffic of the network till network traffic does not become higher than channel capacity. If amount of
time taken by packet in MAC layer is within the uppar bound, then protocol is said to be stable by
delay. As network traffic increases, if throughput doesnot collapse then MAC protocol is said to be
stable by throughput.
If channel capacity demands of all nodes are equivalent, each communication node among all
nodes in a network should be allocated an equal channel capacity. In some cases Communication
network may contain nodes which demand variable channel capacity. Based on the relative channel
capacity demands different weights are assigned to different communicating nodes. Allocating equal
channel capacity to all nodes is a difficult task because, to design utilization of a communication
channel by all sensor nodes, information known to different nodes during protocol working is
required and communication channels of WSNs are time varying.
Sensor nodes get power from low capacity batteries inside it. In WSNs sensor nodes are
placed in remote environment. So it is difficult to change node batteries due to which lifetime of a
sensor node is reduced. By using low power chips in a sensor nodes, its energy consumption can be
reduced. If at a given time two or more sensor nodes transmit its data then collision occurs due to
which energy get wasted in resending the data destroyed or corrupted in collision. Whenever a
packet is transmitted to any node, there is a possibility that it may get received by some other node.
Large energy is used by receiver to receive any packet if transmitter energy is less. To coordinate
communication channel access there is need of control packet. If such control packets are transmitted
in large amount as compared to the number of data packets, then it causes loss of energy. By
reducing rate of change of sensor node i.e. by reducing time interval between active mode and sleep
mode of sensor node energy wastage can be avoided [2].
IV. TRADITIONAL MAC PROTOCOLS
The capability of a wireless sensor network depends on type of media access control protocol
used for it. Various nodes in WSN can access communication channel by different ways. Most
common strategies includes fixed access strategies and random access strategies.

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Fixed assignment strategies: In fixed assignment protocols, irrespective of the need, channel
assignment is fixed. In this strategy, each node can use its resources exclusively such that collisions
will not occur. There are two types of fixed assignment strategies which include long term fixed
assignment protocols and short term fixed assignment protocols. For long term fixed assignment
strategies duration of channel assignment is for minutes, hours etc whereas for short term fixed
assignment strategies, wireless channel is assigned to communicating nodes for very short duration
of time like milliseconds or tens of milliseconds. Due to such channel assignment for very short
duration data bursting may occur. Due to fixed channel assignment, it becomes very easy to
implement such protocols. In WSNs many devices need variations in channel assignment. Such
communication variations needs are neglected by fixed fixed assignment protocols. If network
condition is varying oftenly because of changes occurred in topology, dying and newly forned nodes,
changing data transmission patterns, it becomes inflexible to implement fixed assignment protocols.
Because of such temporary and self creating nature of WSNs, fixed assignment channel access
protocols are used for them in rare cases. To reform channel assignment to nodes used in varying
network configurations, signalling techniques are required in fixed assignment protocols.
Typical protocols that include this strategy are Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA),
Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA), Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Space
Division Multiple Access (SDMA).
TDMA: In TDMA, entire radiofrequency spectrum is divided into different time slots and each node
is allowed to transmit and receive its data during that time slot. All time slots forms one frame and
channel is considered as a time slot that repeats in each frame. Each TDMA frame contains preamble,
an information message and trail bits.
Preamble Information Message Trail
BitsSlot 1 Slot 2 Slot N
Fig. 2a. TDMA Frame Structure
Trail Bits Sync.
Bits
Information
Data
Guard
Bits
Fig. 2b. Time Slot
Addresses required by transmitter and receiver to identify each other is specified in preamble.
Synchronisation of receiver between different time slots is provided using guard bits. Half of time
slots in information message is used for transmission and remaining are used for reception so
duplexers are not required. Any node transmits its data in buffer and burst method i.e transmission is
discontinues due to this high synchronisation bits are required in TDMA systems[3].
FDMA: In FDMA system, a unique frequency band is allocated to each node as a communication
channel. Individual nodes who request for resources get individual channel on demand. No other
node can use that channel during data transmission. Two frequencies are assigned as a
communication channel to individual node. One is for forward path and another is for reverse path.
Once channel is established, transmitter and receiver can operate simultaneously. In FDMA, data
transmission is continuous hence less synchronisation bits are required as compared to TDMA
system. Due to simultaneous working of transmitter and receiver, duplexers are required which
increases cost [3].
CDMA: Various sensor nodes can transmit their data simultaneously by using code division multiple
access technique which is a spread spectrum based scheme. In spread spectrum technique, binary

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data to be transmitted is given to the channel encoder. At the output of channel encoder, an analog
signal is produced with one centre frequency and its bandwidth is limited around that frequency. This
modulated signal is transmitted over communication channel alongwith spreading code which is digit
sequence generated by pseudorandom generator. Because of this spreading code, the bandwidth of
the transmitted signal becomes very high as compared to original signal. The received signal is
demodulated using same spreading code.
Mainly there are two types of spread spectrum techniques: Frequency Hopping Spread
Spectrum and Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum. In frequency hopping spread spectrum multiple
channels which are formed by different carrier frequencies are assigned to input signal. 2k
channels
are formed by 2k
carrier frequencies. Spreading code decides sequence of channels used because each
k bit of the spreading code decides one of the 2k
carrier frequency. Transmitter uses one channel at a
time for fixed time interval. During that time interval binary bits which are encoded by using digital
to analogue encoding scheme are transmitted. The received signal is again demodulated by
frequencies decided by spreading code to produce output data[4].
In direct sequence spread spectrum each input bit which is to be transmitted is represented by
multiple bits using spreading code e.g. input bit 1 can be represented by spreading code <1 0 0 1>,
and 0 can be represented by using spreading code <0 1 1 0>. Depending upon number of bits used in
spreading code, input signal is spread over wide range of frequency. Four bit spreading code will
spread input signal over frequency band which is four times higher than one bit spreading code.
Input bit stream is combined with spreading code using exclusive –OR e.g. in above example input
bit 1 is Ex-ORed with each bit in its spreading code to form a bit sequence < 1 0 0 1> which is
transmitted over communication channel. In similar way, input bit 0 is transmitted as <0 1 1 0>. At
receiver received bits are again XORed with spreading code identical to that used at transmitter to
receive original input information [4].
SDMA: In Space Division Multiple Access technique, Central base station contains spot beam
antennas which control radiated energy for all nodes in networks. Spot beam antennas may use same
frequency or different frequencies for various nodes covered in their area. When same frequency is
to be used for different nodes present in the network, then TDMA or CDMA has to be employed. If
frequencies need to be use are different, then FDMA technique should be employed. Nodes should
be physically separated by sufficient distance to avoid cochannel interference which limits number of
nodes in the network[3].
Demand Assignment Strategies: In fixed assignment channel access protocols, capacity of a
channel is assigned to all nodes in the network irrespective of their needs. In demand assignment
strategies, channel capacity is allocated to communicating nodes in optimum fashion. All nodes
which are in idle state are neglected by demand assignment protocols and nodes which are ready to
transmit are only taken into consideration while channel capacity assignment. Time for which
channel is allocated to communicating nodes depends on time that nodes require to transmit a packet.
Network control mechanism is required to provide arbitrary access of the communication
channel to communicating nodes. When any nodes need to have access to the communication
channel, it should send request by using logical control channel other than data channel. There may
be delay in data transmission because of request for channel access. Demand assignment channel
access methods are again classified into two types, centralised control and distributed control [2] .
Centralised Control: In a centralized control, Central controller sends query massage in some
specific order, whether any communicating node has a data to transfer. If node is intended to transmit
its data, it accepts query message sent by central controller. Once query request is accepted, central
controller, channel is allocated to ready mode by controller to transmit nodes data at full data rate.

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Node rejects controller request if it does not have data to transmit. After rejection, controller
transmits its query message to another node in the network. Few nodes which have large amount of
data to transfer are often polled by central controller however all nodes get equal access to
communication channel. Controller generates many messages to query all nodes in the network, due
to which large overhead is required which is limitation of centralised control strategy of demand
assignment channel access protocols.
Distributed Control: Some time slots are used for carrying reservation messages in distributed
control scheme. Reservation messages are called minislots as they are smaller than data packets.
When any nodes wants to transmit its data, it sends reservation message to the central controller
using reservation minislot. Usually unique minislot is assigned for each user whereas in some cases
nodes sends request to have access to minislot. Controller declares a transmission schedule for
requesting user after reception of its request. Collision can be avoided by providing unique
reservation minislot to each user or by scheduling urgent data before delay insensitive data by
controller [2].
Random Assignment Protocols
In FDMA scheme, a frequency band, and in TDMA scheme, a time slot is allocated to each
communicating node. Even though node doesn’t have a data to transmit, channel sources are
assigned to communicating nodes. Bandwidth allocated is wasted if node doesn’t have any data to
transmit. Bandwidth is not preallocated to communicating nodes, in random assignment strategies.
Communication channel should be accessed by which communicating node is not decided by
random access protocols also time required for any node to transmit is not assigned by random
assignment strategies. If two or more nodes transmits data at a same time, collision can occure.
Random assignment protocols must include collision detection mechanism and retransmission
scheme for collided packets. Some random assignment protocols includes, ALOHA, Slotted ALOHA,
CSMA/CD (carrier sense multiple access with collision detection), CSMA/CA (carrier sense
multiple access with collision avoidance).
ALOHA: ALOHA is used to provide shared communication channel access to users which are not
coordinated. In ALOHA, whenever a node is ready to transmit a data, it is simply allowed to transmit.
Transmitting communication node listens for some period once it completes data transmission. Time
for which transmitting communication node listens is equal to the time required for data to travel
between two nodes which are farthest apart from each other in the network.. Once data is received by
receiver node, it examines the error checksum to verify whether data is correct. After verifying the
correctness of data, receiving node sends an acknowledgement. Successful transmission occurs if,
before the completion of time for which transmitting node listens, it receives acknowledgment. If
noise is present in the communication channel, or if collision occurs, then data is lost and
acknowledgement is not generated. Nodes can be added or removed easily in the network as no
central control is present in ALOHA. When traffic is less nodes can get access to communication
channel in short period of time. Drawback of ALOHA is that, when traffic is high, collisions are
rapidly increases due to which degradation of network performance takes place [7][8].
Slotted ALOHA: Channel is divide into equal length time slots which are having higher length than
duration of packet. In Slotted ALOHA, packets are distributed in discrete manner i.e. only at the
beginning of a new time slot, each node transmits a massage. Collision of one packet with portion of
another is avoided in this strategy. If complete collisions occur, packets get destroyed which are need
to transmit again if number of users increases. Traffic delay characteristics are determined by the
number of time slots for which any node waits before retransmitting packets lost in collision [3].

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CSMA: ALOHA protocol cannot get information about other nodes in the network because sender
doesn’t listen for channel before transmission. Greater output can be obtained if, before transmission,
channel is listened by transmitter. In CSMA protocols, before transmitting information, each node in
the network is able to listen channel condition. Based on specific algorithm, sender is made to send
data, if channel is idle. Time required by a node to sense whether the channel is idle or not is known
as detection delay [3]. CSMA protocols are divided into two categories non persistent CSMA and
persistent CSMA. In non persistent CSMA protocol, before transmission, sender senses channel to
determine if another node is transmitting data. Sender waits for an acknowledgement after
transmitting data if channel is idle. If noise is present on channel or if collisions occurred then data
gets lost and sender cannot receive acknowledgement. Packet retransmission is scheduled by sender
in such cases. Sender nods goes into back off mode if channel is found busy for random amount of
time. This process is repeated till successful data transmission is occurred. The major limitation of
non persistent CSMA is that, when sender node is back off, channel may remain idle which causes
overall throughput reduction due to channel capacity wastage. To eliminate the limitation of
nonpersistent CSMA, P-persistent CSMA protocols are developed. In 1-persistent CSMA scheme a
node first sense a channel if is ready to send packet, Node transmits its packet if channel is free. If
busy channel is sensed, till channel becomes idle, node persistently continues to listen. When
channel is sensed as idle, sender node transmits its data.
In p persistent CSMA, Probability that sender node sends data after sensing idle channel is p
and probability that sender waits for specific time period before trying to transmit packet again is 1-p.
Time for which sender waits before transmitting packet is equal to the time required for packet to
travel between two nodes which are farthest apart from each other in case of unslotted ALOHA or
time slot in case of slotted ALOHA. Node again sense channel after completion of waiting period.
Node continues to listen again if channel is sensed as busy. If channel is sensed as idle, node
transmits its packet with probably of p.
There are few drawbacks of CSMA based scheme. Even after collision occurs, sender node
continues to transmit data packet. Each node has to wait till previous packet is transmitted
successfully before sending new packet. These drawbacks of CSMA based schemes are avoided if
communicating node, while transmitting data, is able to listen channel which is provided by
CSMA/CD protocol [2].
CSMA/CD: In CSMA/CD based scheme, when collision occurs, node is able to detect it by
monitoring signal on the channel. Sender node first determines if any other node is transmitting its
packet over the communication channel by listening the channel. If no other node is transmitting a
packet over communication channel, then sender starts transmitting its data and while transmitting, it
continuously listens a channel. Sender node stops its transmission immediately if other interfering
signal is detected over communication channel. This saves the amount of bandwidth required for
transmitting signal after detection of collision. Sender node waits for a random amount of time
before transmitting packet again after detection of collision. As distance increases, signal power is
reduced also wireless channels are time varying due to which it becomes difficult for sender node to
determine whether collision is present or not at the receiver node which limits the use of CSMA/CD
strategy [2].
CSMA/CA: Carrier sense multiple access collision avoidance makes use of RTS (Request to send),
CTS (Clear to send) handshake to avoid collision. Suppose that node A wants to transmit a data
packet to node B. Sender node A first monitors a channel to determine if any other node is
transmitting data over that channel. If channel is found as idle, sender node A transmits a RTS packet
to all other nodes in the communication range of node A. The RTS packet contains destination
address and time required for data packet transmission completion and acknowledgement reception.

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All nodes in the communication range of node A except node B avoids transmitting their data after
receiving RTS packet by node A till data transmission is completed successfully between node A and
B. After receiving RTS packet by sent by node A, node B transmits a CTS packet to all nodes in the
communication range of node B. CTS packet contains time remained for data transmission
completion between node A and node B. After receiving CTS packet sent by node B, all nodes in the
communication range of node B except node A avoids data transmission till successful transmission
occurs between node A and B. After receiving CTS packet sent by node B, node A starts transmitting
its data to node B. When node A completes transmitting data to node B, node B sends
acknowledgement which indicates data is transmitted successfully form node A to node B [2].
V. MAC PROTOCOLS FOR WSNs
When a node receives a packet intended for other sensor nodes, energy consumption is
increased in receiving and decoding those packets. After realising that these packets are not destined
to that particular node which receives them, those packets are dropped. When any node listens to a
channel for large amount of time, again energy consumption is increased. When two or more sensor
nodes attempt to transmit simultaneously, collision may occur Retransmission of such colliding
packets is yet another source of significant energy wastage. Such excessive power consumption leads
to degradation of MAC layer protocol performance. Reduction of the wastage of energy caused by
such reasons is the main aim of MAC protocols. There are two types of MAC protocols, schedule
based and contention based MAC protocol. In schedule based MAC protocols, schedule decides
access of channel to all nodes. Channel is preallocated to individual sensor nodes and at a one time
channel is accessed by one sensor node. Preallocation of resources to individual sensor node is
avoided in contention based MAC protocols. All nodes can access single communication channel on
demand. If multiple nodes tries to access channel at a same time, collisions may occur which should
be minimized or completely avoided in contention based MAC layer protocols. Communicating
nodes should access to channel based on distributed and randomized algorithms which can be
rescheduled to eliminate collision. To avoid energy wastage caused by listening packets destined to
other sensor nodes, node goes into sleep rate when they become inactive.
Schedule Based MAC Protocols
Schedule based MAC protocols uses time slots, frequency bands or spreading code as used in
CDMA as communication channel. Variant of TDMA scheme, where channel is divided into
different time slots are used by many schedule based protocols. One frame is repeated cyclically over
time which is logically formed by a set of N time slots. For working of sensor node in each logical
frame, a schedule is formed by assigning a set of specific time slots to each sensor node. Based on
that schedule, a sensor node alternates between two modes of operation i.e. active mode and sleep
mode. In particular time slot which is assigned to a sensor node, it goes into active mode where
sensor transmits and receives data frames. Outside of the time slot which is assigned to that sensor
node, it goes into sleep mode in which radio trans receivers are off to conserve the energy.
Self Organising Medium Access Control Protocol for Sensor Networks (SMAC)
In SMAC for communication with known neighbours, a superframe, which is a TDMA like
frame having fixed length is maintained by each node in a network. Super frame consists of smaller
frames having size variable in time for a single node. In self organizing media access control
protocols, Neighbouring nodes are detected by executing a neighbourhood discovery procedure.
Each node assigns a unique time slot to link connecting that node to each neighbour node. Time slots
should be selected such that in each time slot node can talk only to its neighbours. Since node and its
neighbours can transmit a data in a same time slot, interference between neighbour links is avoided

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by proper link establishment procedure. To achieve this, FDMA technique or spreading code as used
in CDMA technique is assigned to each link. Each node has its own schedule of time slots with all its
neighbours by using super frame structure. Radios of nodes should be tuned to proper frequency
channel if FDMA technique is used or spreading code if CDMA technique is assigned to channel.
Bluetooth
Piconet is known as a group of devices sharing a common channel. For controlling channel
access of at most seven group participant slave devices, master unit is present in each piconet. 625-
ms slots forms one channel. 48 bit Bluetooth device address of master and clock determines a unique
frequency hopping pattern assigned to each piconet. Frequency hopping sequence assigned to each
piconet is followed by all slave devices in that piconet. Bridge nodes can be used to connect piconets
to each other to form scatternets which are larger adhoc networks. A unique 3 bit internal address is
assigned to each slave device by master within piconet. A slotted time division duplex protocol, in
which time slots are allocated to slave nodes by master with the help of polling protocol is used to
regulate access to the channel. Piconet master and slave can exchange packet in two time slots which
forms a Bluetooth frame. Slave devices are polled by master continuously for communication. If
master addresses a slave in one time slot, then slave can communicate in next time slot [2].
TRAMA (Traffic Adaptive Medium Access)
For achieving collision free channel and energy efficiency, a TDMA based protocol, known
as Traffic Adaptive Medium Access( TRAMA) has been designed. In this protocol, collision free
transmission is ensured and when nodes are not transmitting or receiving, they are switched to low
power idle state to reduce wastage of power. It assumes time synchronization of nodes and time is
divided into cycles and each cycle consists of random access and schedule access periods. When
channel access is contention based, In order to establish two hope topology information random
access period is used. TRAMA consists of three main parts, neighbour protocol, schedule exchange
protocol and adaptive election algorithm. For information collection of neighbouring nodes, the
neighbour protocol is used. To exchange two hope neighbour information, by using small timeslots
which are randomly selected, the schedule exchange protocol is used. Using neighbourhood and
schedule information, in order to decide the transmitting and receiving nodes, an adaptive election
algorithm is used. A current schedule is transmitted to neighbour by schedule exchange protocol. By
using random access phase, neighbours schedule can be received by node. Node decides which slot
from schedule access phase can be used by using neighbour schedule information. For this time slot
selection, each node, by using global hash function h calculates priority P for its node identifier X for
each time slot. Priority P is given by P(x,t) = h(x©t) where x©t is the concatenation of x with current
time t. Each node calculates its priority. X transmits its packets in the time slot for which X has
highest priority value among all its two hop neighbours [5] [6].
Data Gathering MAC (D-MAC)
For tree based data gathering, a schedule based MAC protocol, known as data gathering
medium access control protocol is designed in wireless sensor networks. This protocol is mainly
designed to maintain energy efficiency while achieving low latency. This protocol uses small time
slots and within each slot, uses carrier sense multiple access with acknowledgement for transmission
and reception of one packet. Communicating node uses one slot for transmission, one slot for
reception and n slots for sleep mode. If at a depth of n in the tree, source node is present, it transmits
single packet to the sink node with n time slots delay which is of the order of tens of milliseconds [5].
In order to solve the interface problem between nodes on different branches of tree, D-MAC uses an
MTS (More to Send) control packet. If channel is busy, node cannot send its packet. In such case,

89
node sends request MTS packet to its parent node in data gathering tree for waking up one receiving
slot time earlier [6].
Fig. 3. DMAC in data gathering tree
Contention based Protocols
Protocols for which channel access among all nodes does not require any coordination among
them is known as contention based protocol or random access based protocols. Before attempt to
access channel, for a random duration of time colliding nodes goes into back off state. To make these
protocols robust and to improve their performance, RTS (request to send) and CTS (clear to send)
mechanisms and collision avoidance techniques are used along with these protocols. Due to large
overhead requirement, idle listening, collision and overhearing, there are limitations on energy
efficiency of contention based MAC layer protocols. Random access MAC layer protocols should be
designed in order to reduce the energy waste for extending the network lifetime.
PAMAS (Power Aware Multi-access Signalling)
In order to achieve energy efficiency, one of the earliest contention based MAC protocol
designed is Power Aware Multi-access Signalling protocol. Two separate signalling channels for the
data and control packets are used by this protocol due to which overhearing is avoided among
neighbouring nodes. In PAMAS, nodes which are not transmitting or receiving are turned “OFF” by
combining the use of a busy tone with RTS and CTS packets. At each sensor nodes, two radios in
different frequency bands are required due to which design complexity, size and cost of sensors is
increased. Node switches between sleep and wake up state rapidly due to which significant power
consumption occurs. Idle listening causes energy wastage which cannot be reduced by PAMAS
protocol [9][10].
STEM (Sparse Topology and Energy Management)
Sparse topology and energy management protocol uses two radio channels, a wake up radio
channel and a data radio channel. For wake up signal, instead of encoded data, busy tone is used by a
variant of STEM. In STEM protocol, till communication with any node is desired, one node turns off
its data radio channel. Node transmits data on a wake up radio channel, when it has a data to transmit.
Wake up signal channel acts like a paging signal. Till all neighbouring nodes are paged, transmission
of this signal lasts. Nodes may remain awake for long period after it awakes from its sleeping mode,
to receive “session” of packets. Before going into sleep mode, node can also awaked to receive all its
pending packets. Wastage of energy occurs in continues transmission of wake up signals if frequent
events are occurred [11].
More active slots if necessary

90
Timeout-MAC
To communicate with each other, in timeout-MAC, node use RTS and CTS
acknowledgement packet to ensure reliable transmission and avoid collision. To adapt traffic load
variations and to reduce energy consumption, an adaptive duty cycle is used by this protocol. All
messages are transmitted in variable length burst to avoid idle listening. Between burst, nodes are
allowed to sleep. During the active period, node keeps listening and frame which contains messages
stored in buffer are transmitted. For a predetermined time interval (Ta), when no active event occurs,
an active period ends. Time interval after which active period ends is equal to sum of contention
interval length, RTS packet length, time interval between the end of the RTS packet and the
beginning of the CTS packet, CTS packet length.
active
Ta sleep
Burst of Data
Fig. 4. T-MAC Scheme
Active event includes reception of data over the radio, hearing of a periodic frame timer,
collision sensing on the channel. The node goes into sleep mode at the end of the active period [12].
B-MAC ( Berkeley- Media Access Control)
B-MAC is designed for N sender to 1 receiver transmission in an adhoc networks of nodes.
Periodically sleep/wake up cycles are used by B-MAC protocol. This protocol uses LPL (Low Power
Listening) mechanism. In this mechanism, node listens for incoming data transmission in the wake
up time. If “false positive” occurs i.e. no data is received, listen state is interrupted by timeout
otherwise node waits for a complete packet transmission. After wake up, to verify the completion of
packet reception from the beginning, a 100 ms preamble time is added. LPL doesn’t guarantee
fairness. For different nodes, sleep period can be different. Node starts to send an announcement by
switching radio mode when node has a data to send. Even if receiver starts sleeping at the beginning,
this announcement should be long enough so that receiver can notice. After that sender sends target
address and data transmission starts. B-MAC uses clear channel assessment (CCA) to reduce amount
of needed energy and clear channel detection [13].
S-MAC (Sensor MAC)
For wireless sensor networks, S-MAC which is a contension based protocol inherited from
CSMA/CA (Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance) is designed. To avoid energy
wastage and idle listening, S-MAC uses periodic “Listen and Sleep” method in which a periodic
listen and sleep schedule is followed by each node. In listen period, the network is sensed by the
node. If network is found idle, node listens and communicates with other nodes. In sleep period,
nodes turn off their radios and try to sleep which reduces wastage of time during idle listening also
avoids large amount of energy consumption caused by unnecessary idle listening. In S-MAC node
uses RTS (Request to Send), CTS (Clear to Send) and Data Acknowledgement (ACK) for
communication. Node goes into sleep mode after finding a RTS or CTS packet destined for some
other node. Once sleep mode is completed node enters into wake up mode and search for an event.
Node again goes into sleep mode if an event is not found. Synchronisation schedule for sleep and
listen period is shared by broadcasting SYNC packet to neighbouring nodes which forms a virtual
cluster. Due to this, a network may contain multiple clusters. If two neighbouring nodes are present

91
in two different virtual clusters, they may follow two different schedules of those respective virtual
clusters i.e. during listen periods of both clusters, they may wake up which causes energy wastage by
idle listening and overhearing. Basic S-MAC scheme is shown in figure below in which. In figure
below, node 1 transmits data to node 2 [14].
Node 1
SYNC RTS CTS
Received
DATA ACK
Received
SYNC
Received
RTS
Received
CTS DATA
Received
ACK
Node 2
Node 3
SYNC
Received
RTS
Received
CTS
Received
Sleep
Listen Period Sleep Period
Fig. 5. S-MAC Scheme
WiseMAC
WiseMAC is a nonpersistent CSMA and preamble sampling technique based medium access
control protocol developed for wireless sensor networks to reduce consumption of power. WiseMAC
protocol represents an extension of Aloha with preamble sampling. In Aloha with preamble sampling,
for listening the channel, node wakes up from sleep mode. A node listens to the channel for a
constant duration of time known as sampling period independently. If channel is listened as free, till
next time slot appears, node goes back to sleep mode. A sender node sends a long dummy packet,
called preamble having size equal to sampling period in front of every data frame to avoid missing
the neighbours wake up schedule. After wake up, when node detects preamble, it continues to listen
channel till valid data is received. By using an acknowledgement frame (ACK), the reception of
valid message is confirmed. A biggest disadvantage of preamble sampling is that all receivers have
to receive the long preamble even if they are not addressed. WiseMAC tries to use minimum sized
wake up preamble. In WiseMAC sender transmits packet shortly before the receiver is expected to
wake up. To preserve the energy, sender can go in sleep mode during this time. When receiver wakes
up, it can detect the preamble and it remains in wake up mode till data is received. Once data is
received successfully, an ACK frame is transmitted by the receiver.The WiseMAC ACK packet
carries acknowledgement information as well as information for other nodes including sender about
the remaining time of next sampling. This time is stored by other nodes in their table. By using this
information, a node can determine the wake up intervals of all its neighbours and transmit a packet
with minimized size of preamble [15] [16].
VI. CONCLUSION
In recent years, MAC protocols in WSNs have attracted large attention and introduced unique
challenges as compared to traditional MAC protocols in other wireless networks. Several MAC
protocols for WSNs have been proposed by researchers. In this paper survey of schedule based and
contention based MAC protocols for WSNs has been presented.
Collision can be avoided by using TDMA technique. TDMA technique uses idle slots due to
which when less data is to be transmitted, throughput is reduced and clock drift problem arises.

92
Synchronisation of nodes and ability to handle topology changes are critical issues in TDMA
because of insertion and deletion of new nodes. In FDMA technique cost of sensor nodes increases
due to requirement of an additional circuitry for communication with different radio channels which
is a major drawback even though it allows collision free access to medium. CDMA technique also
avoids collision while giving access to channel but requirement of computational complexity
increases energy consumption and cost of sensor network. In order to reduce the computational
complexity, several techniques like use of simple modulation schemes and design of simple receiver
models are adopted. In CSMA/CA channel is listened by nodes all the time due to absence of sleep
periods due to which power is highly consumed.
In Schedule based protocols, TRAMA and DMAC can automatically adapt scheduling to
varying traffic load whereas SMAC provides less traffic adaptively. Ability to handle changes in
network topology is moderate to high in SMAC and TRAMA whereas DMAC provides less
adaptivity to changes in topology. SMAC and TRAMA provides high latency in time as compared to
DMAC.
Simulation results show that in SMAC,when any node detects RTS, CTS packet destined to
other node, it goes into sleep mode due to which under high traffic conditions power consumption
decreases. SMAC provides fixed duty cycle to all nodes. When traffic load is high to avoid dropping
of messages a large value duty cycle must be selected which reduces idle listening and power
consumption. SMAC achieves acceptable results when low power listening is used. When T-MAC is
used with LPL it produces better results regarding power consumption and network lifetime as
compared with SMAC. In terms of power consumption simulations show that WiseMAC provides
best results as compared to other MAC protocols.
The paper begins by introducing wireless sensor networks and characteristics of MAC
protocols used in general wireless networks. We have briefly described four schedule based and six
contention based MAC protocols for WSNs. Finally we have compared performance of various
schedule based and contention based MAC protocols for achieving certain requirements. Though
many MAC schemes have been proposed for WSNs, there is no standard MAC protocol because
MAC protocol depends on certain application. We expect that this survey will help researchers in
selecting MAC protocols for WSNs in order to achieve satisfactory results in certain application.
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