Exploiting maximum performance of multichannel multiple access using half-duplex transceiver

A slot-optimised multichannel medium access control (SO-MMAC) protocol is proposed to resolve the multichannel hidden terminal problem and control channel (CCH) bottleneck problem for multihop ad hoc networks. It adjusts the relationship between the reservation slot (RS) on the CCH and the data packet transmission slot on the data channel (DCH) to achieve the best load balance and default collision-free DCH selection without establishing a channel state table, and then greatly enhances multiple access efficiency. A reservation scheme with minimum handshakes and RS and contention micro-slot backoff mechanisms is also proposed to effectively decrease control overhead and packet collisions. Simulation results show that SO-MMAC has better performance compared to the traditional MAC protocol.