• Journal of Information Processing Systems
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.1229-1242
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• 2017

In this paper, an interference aware distributed multi-channel MAC (IDMMAC) protocol is proposed for wireless sensor and actor networks (WSANs). The WSAN consists of a huge number of sensors and ample amount of actors. Hence, in the IDMMAC protocol a lightweight channel selection mechanism is proposed to enhance the sensor's lifetime. The IDMMAC protocol divides the beacon interval into two phases (i.e., the ad-hoc traffic indication message (ATIM) window phase and data transmission phase). When a sensor wants to transmit event information to the actor, it negotiates the maximum packet reception ratio (PRR) and the capacity channel in the ATIM window with its 1-hop sensors. The channel negotiation takes place via a control channel. To improve the packet delivery ratio of the IDMMAC protocol, each actor selects a backup cluster head (BCH) from its cluster members. The BCH is elected based on its residual energy and node degree. The BCH selection phase takes place whenever an actor wants to perform actions in the event area or it leaves the cluster to help a neighbor actor. Furthermore, an interference and throughput aware multi-channel MAC protocol is also proposed for actor-actor coordination. An actor selects a minimum interference and maximum throughput channel among the available channels to communicate with the destination actor. The performance of the proposed IDMMAC protocol is analyzed using standard network parameters, such as packet delivery ratio, end-to-end delay, and energy dissipation, in the network. The obtained simulation results indicate that the IDMMAC protocol performs well compared to the existing MAC protocols.