TR-MAC: An Energy-Efficient MAC Protocol for Wireless Sensor Networks exploiting Noise-based Transmitted Reference Modulation

Energy-constrained behavior of sensor nodes is one of the most important criteria for successful deployment of wireless sensor networks. The medium access control (MAC) protocol determines the time a sensor node transceiver spends listening or transmitting, and hence the energy consumption of the overall node. Transmitted reference (TR) modulation as the underlying physical layer provides new opportunities and challenges to be explored in the MAC layer. To utilize the advantages and overcome the challenges provided by the TR modulation, a new energy-efficient MAC protocol TR-MAC that uses noise-based carrier for wireless sensor networks is proposed in this paper. TR-MAC realizes multiple access using individual frequency offsets for a pair of nodes, allows both transmitter-driven and receiver-driven communication and is suitable for asynchronous low data rate application. TRMAC enables energy-driven communication since nodes can adapt their duty cycle based on available energy, thus the protocol becomes energyefficient.