Mobility-aware MAC protocol for delay-sensitive wireless sensor networks

Most of the MAC protocols proposed for the wireless sensor networks (WSN) assume sensor nodes to be static and therefore they usually fail or provide very bad network performance in mobile sensor networks. Since WSN mobile applications have become popular nowadays, there is a need for MAC protocols that consider mobility. In this paper, we propose a mobility-aware MAC protocol for WSN that can work with satisfactory performance in both stationary and mobile sensor networks. Furthermore, most of the WSN mobile applications are considered critical ones (e.g. a patient assistance system which monitors patients´ health via wearable bio-sensors). Such applications require very quick responses. So, in addition to handling mobility, the proposed MAC protocol considers the problem of latency as well. In summary, this paper proposes a WSN MAC protocol (MD-SMAC) that is considered to be mobility-aware, delay-sensitive and provides satisfactory level of energy efficiency. In addition, we study the performance of the proposed MD-SMAC protocol by simulating it using the NS-2 simulator and comparing it to other WSN MAC protocols. The results show that the MD-SMAC protocol outperforms other existing WSN MAC protocols in terms of mobility-handling, delay-reduction, and energy-efficiency in scenarios involving mobile sensors.