A Power Efficient Access Method by Polling for Wireless Mesh Networks

Abstract

This paper proposes a power efficient access method by polling for wireless mesh networks, which is robust to channel variation due to movement in surrounding communication environment. In the proposed method, all intermittent nodes periodically repeat ID transmission and succeeding short period of receiving state. A node having a packet to transmit goes into continuous receiving state. Right after receiving an ID transmission from an arbitrary node, it transmits the packet to the node of preceding ID transmission. In a conventional access method for wireless mesh network, a transmitting node specifies a receiving node well ahead of transmission, leading to a possible change in wireless link quality at the time of transmitting packet from the time of determining receiving node. The proposed access method is robust to wireless channel variation, in the sense that a transmitting node chooses a receiving node just before transmitting packet. The simulation results show its robustness to wireless channel variations. With the proposed access method, a whole network consumes about one sixth power compared with those f a conventional method.