Low-power access protocols based on scheduling for wireless and mobile ATM networks

This paper presents the design and analysis of a medium access control protocol called EC-MAC (energy conserving medium access protocol) that supports multimedia traffic for wireless ATM networks. The objective of protocol design is to develop a low-power access protocol that will provide support for different traffic types with quality-of-service (QoS). The network architecture is derived from a testbed built at Bell Labs called SWAN (Seamless Wireless ATM network). The network is based on the infrastructure model where one base station serves all the mobiles currently in its cell. A reservation based approach is proposed, with appropriate scheduling of the requests from the mobiles. This strategy is utilized to accomplish the goals of reduced power consumption and support service quality provision in wireless links. Simulation based performance analysis of the protocol for voice, video and data traffic is presented.