A Multi-channel Scheduling Scheme for Collision-Free High-Rate WPANs

Ultra wide-band (UWB) technologies are being feverishly developed in the technical community. UWB devices are expected to operate at rates of up to 0.5 Gb/s and communicate with other devices at a range of up to 10 m. Thus, UWB technologies are being developed as core technology for high-speed wireless personal area networks. The salient features of UWB networks—high-rate communications, low interference with other radio systems, and low power consumption—bring many benefits to users. Thus, they enable consumers to experience new applications such as wireless universal serial bus for connecting personal computers to their peripherals and the consumer–electronics in people’s living rooms. However, if multiple WiMedia logical link protocol Service Sets (WSSs) coexist in an adjacent area, various conflicts among independent WSSs can occur frequently. In order to solve this problem, we propose a multi-channel scheduling scheme (MCS) for the coexistence of adjacent WSSs. The proposed MCS scheme can scan new idle channel and detect its time offset where a WSS device can transmit a new beacon frame and data frames without conflicts. We also evaluate the performance of the proposed MCS scheme through various simulations in terms of several metrics. Simulation results demonstrate that the MCS scheme can minimize the possibility of data frame collisions by efficiently managing the multiple available channels in a hybrid manner combining proactive and reactive methods.