3.

Medium Access Control

 Introduction CSMA/MACA
 SDMA, FDMA,  Polling
TDMA  CDMA
 Aloha/ Slotted  Comparison
ALOHA
 Introduction
• Multiple access issues
– Wireless Channel (Wireless medium) is shared among multiple
neighboring nodes
– If more than one MS transmit at a time on the shared media, a collision
occur
– How to determine which MS can transmit?
 Wireless MAC Issues

• Wireless medium makes the MAC design

more challenging than the wireline
networks.
• The three important issues are:
1. Half Duplex operation –> Either send or
receive but not both at a given time
2. Time varying channel
3. Burst channel errors
 Wireless MAC Issues

1. Half Duplex Operation

• In wireless, Its difficult to receive data when the
transmitter is sending the data, because:
– When node is transmitting, a large fraction of the
signal energy leaks into the receiver pat
– The transmitted and received power levels can differ
by orders of magnitude
– The leakage signal typically has much higher power
than the received signal -> “Impossible to detect a
received signal, while transmitting data
– Focus on collision
avoidance
CSMA/CD (Ethernet MAC) cannot be used as it is
– Focus on collision avoidance
 Wireless MAC Issues

2. Time Varying Channel

– The received signal by a node is a
superposition of time-shifted and attenuated
versions of the transmitted signals -> The
received signal varies with time
– The time varying signals (time varying channel)
phenomenon -> also known as multipath
propagation
– When a node’s received signal strength drops
below a certain threshold the node is said to
be in fade
 Wireless MAC Issues
3. Burst Channel Errors
– As a consequence of time varying channel and varying
signals strengths Æ errors are introduced in the transmission
(Very likely)
– For wireline networks the bit error rate (BER) is typically 10-6
i.e. the probability of packet error is small
– For wireline networks the errors are due to random nois
– For wireless networks the BER is as high as 10-3
For wireless networks the errors are due to node being in
fade as a result errors occur in a long burst
– Packet loss due to burst errors - mitigation techniques
• Smaller packets
• Forward Error Correcting Codes
• Retransmissions (Acks)
Location Dependent Carrier Sensing
• In free space signal decays with the square of
distance
– Implication is that the carrier sensing becomes
a function of the position of the receiver relative to
the transmitter
– In wireless medium due to multi-path propagation,
the signal strength decay according to a power law
with distance
• Only nodes within a specific radius of the transmitter
can detect the carrier on the channel
 Motivation

• Is it possible to use MAC schemes from wired

networks to wireless networks?
Example:
• Carrier sense multiple access with collision
detection (CSMA/CD)
– A sender senses the medium (a wire or coaxial
cable) to see if it is free.
– Sender transmits data and listens for the medium
to detect collision
Motivation..

• Problems in wireless
– Strength of a signal decreases proportionally to
the square of the distance to the sender
– The sender may apply CA and CD, but the collision
happens at the receiver
– The sender might not detect collision, but actually
the receiver might have destroyed the data.
– Collision detection is very difficult in wireless as
the power of transmitting antenna is higher than
the receiving power.
 Motivation- hidden and exposed terminals

• Hidden
– A sends to B, but not C
– C wants to send B, C senses the medium is free (CS
fails)
– Collision at B, A cannot detect the collision (CD fails)
– A is hidden for C and vice versa.

A B C
 Motivation- hidden and exposed terminals

Exposed terminals
– B sends to A, C wants to send to another terminal
(not A or B)
– C has to wait, C signals a medium in use
– but A is outside the radio range of C, therefore
waiting is not necessary
– C is “exposed” to B
 Motivation - near and far terminals

Terminals A and B send, C receives

– signal strength decreases proportional to the square of the
distance
– the signal of terminal B therefore drowns out A’s signal
– C cannot receive A

A B C
If C for example was an arbiter for sending rights, terminal B would
drown out terminal A already on the physical layer
Also severe problem for CDMA-networks - precise power control
needed
Media Access Control
 Access methods SDMA/FDMA/TDMA
SDMA (Space Division Multiple Access)
– segment space into sectors, use directed antennas
– cell structure
FDMA (Frequency Division Multiple Access)
– assign a frequency to a transmission channel
– permanent (e.g., radio broadcast), slow hopping (e.g.,
GSM), fast hopping (FHSS, Frequency Hopping Spread
Spectrum)
TDMA (Time Division Multiple Access)
– assign the fixed sending frequency to a transmission
channel between a sender and a receiver for a certain
amount of time
FDDuplex/FDMA- general scheme. Example GSM

f
960 MHz 124

1 200 kHz
935.2 MHz
20 MHz
915 MHz 124

1
890.2 MHz

fd = fu + 45 Mhz
 FDD..

• Transmitter and receiver should know the

frequencies in advance
• Uplink (from mobile station to base stations or
from ground control to satellite)
• Downlink (from base station to mobile station
or from satellite to ground control)
TDD/TDMA-general scheme, example DECT

417 µs

1 2 3 11 12 1 2 3 11 12

t
downlink uplink
 TDD
• Assigning different slots for uplink and downlink
using the same frequency
• The base station uses one out of 12 slots for the
downlink, whereas the mobile station uses one
out of 12 different slots for the uplink.
• Uplink and downlink are separated in time.
• Up to 12 different mobile stations can use the
same frequency without interference using this
scheme.
• Each connection is allotted its own up- and
downlink pair.
 ALOHA (Pure ALOHA)

• Developed in the 1970s for a packet radio

network by Hawaii University.
• Whenever a terminal (MS) has data, it
transmits. Sender finds out whether
transmission was successful or experienced a
collision by listening to the broadcast from the
destination station. Sender retransmits after
some random time if there is a collision.
 Pure ALOHA
Collision Mechanism in ALOHA

• when frame first arrives - transmit

immediately
 Pure ALOHA
• collision probability increases:
• frame sent at t0 collides with other frames sent in
[t0-1, t0+1]
 Throughput of Pure ALOHA

• The probability of successful transmission Ps is the

probability no other packet is scheduled in an
interval of length 2T.

where g is the packet rate of the traffic.

Defining G = gT to normalize offered load, we have

The Maximum throughput of ALOHA is

 Slotted ALOHA
Assumptions Operation
• all frames same size • when node obtains
• time is divided into equal fresh frame, it
size slots, time to transmit transmits in next slot
1 frame • no collision, node can
• nodes start to transmit send new frame in next
frames only at beginning slot
of slots • if collision, node
• nodes are synchronized retransmits frame in
• if 2 or more nodes each subsequent slot
transmit in slot, all with prob. p until
nodes detect collision success
 Slotted ALOHA

Pros Cons
• single active node can • collisions, wasting slots
continuously transmit at • idle slots
full rate of channel • nodes may be able to
• highly decentralized: only detect collision in less
slots in nodes need to be than time to transmit
in sync packet
• simple • clock synchronization
 Throughput of ALOHA
• The probability of successful transmission Ps is the
probability no other packet is scheduled in an interval of
length T.

where g is the packet rate of the traffic.

• The throughput of slotted ALOHA is :

• Defining G = gT to normalize offered load, we have

• Max throughput achievable by slotted ALOHA is 0.368.

Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA)

• CSMA gives improved throughput compared

to Aloha protocols.
• Listens to the channel before transmitting a
packet (avoid avoidable collisions).
 Distributed MAC Protocols

• Most distributed MAC protocols are based

on the principle of carrier sensing & collision
avoidance (CSMA/CA)
• Hidden terminals play very dominant role in
CSMA/CA based protocols
– Collisions that occur at the destination may not
be heard by the sender
– Therefore receiver has to send some kind of
feedback to sender
Distributed MAC - Hidden Node Problem

• In the diagram simultaneous transmission will collide at B

• Half duplex operation of wireless terminals --> , transmission and
listening simultaneously is not possible.
• A and C have no knowledge of this collision,
• Two ways A & C can know that collision has occurred at
1. A & C periodically stop transmission and listen for feedback from B
2. B uses out of band signaling to inform A & C
• First option is very difficult, second option is possible
but (inefficient) because it requires additional channel
• Two well know approaches of collision avoidance (CA)
– Out-of-band approach
– Hand shaking approach
 CA with out-of-band signaling (1)
• Busy Tone Multiple Access (BTMA) (Tobagi &
Kleinrock, Haas) protocol uses out of band signaling
to solve hidden terminal problem
• Any node hearing ongoing transmission, transmits
busy tone
• All nodes hearing busy tone keep silent
• All nodes in 2R radius of the transmitter keep
silence (R – range)
• Avoids interference from hidden terminals
• Requires a separate channel for busy tone
• Con: Eliminates hidden nodes, increases exposed
nodes
 IEEE 802.11

silenced
M
Y

S silenced
Data D
ACK

X silenced
K
silenced
 CA with out-of-band signaling (2)

• Receiver Initiated Busy Tone Multiple Access

(RIBTMA) (S. Wu. & V.O.K. Li, 1988)
• Only receiver transmits the busy tone
• The receiver decodes the message and verifies
the address that it is indeed the receiver
• The nodes in the vicinity of the receiver
(Radius R) are inhibited
• Does not eliminate hidden terminal problem
completely, but reduces the exposed nodes
 CA with Control Handshaking - (MACA) (1)
MACA (Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance) uses short
signaling packets for collision avoidance
– RTS (request to send): a sender request the right to send from a
receiver with a short RTS packet before it sends a data packet
– CTS (clear to send): the receiver grants the right to send as soon as it
is ready to receive
Signaling packets contain
– sender address
– receiver address
– packet size
Variants of this method can be found in IEEE802.11 as DFWMAC
(Distributed Foundation Wireless MAC)
• When a node (such as D) overhears a CTS, it keeps quiet for the
duration of the transfer
– Transfer duration is included in RTS and CTS both
 MACA examples
• MACA avoids the problem of hidden terminals
– A and C want to
send to B
– A sends RTS first RTS

– C waits after receiving CTS CTS

A B C
CTS from B
• MACA avoids the problem of
exposed terminals
• B wants to send to A, C
to another terminal
• now C does not have
to wait for it cannot
receive CTS from A
CA with Control Handshaking - (MACA) (2)

• Does not completely solve the hidden terminal

problem but does prevent to a large extent

• Enhancements to RTS-CTS control hand shaking

and more complete single channel solutions
[(MACAW (1997), Bhargavan] [Fullmer et al,
(1995, 1997)]
– MACA has no ACK but MACAW does

• In these techniques tradeoff is in the overhead of

handshaking and the number of hidden nodes
removed
 Reliability
• Wireless links are prone to errors. High packet loss rate
detrimental to transport layer performance.
• MACA delegates packet loss recovery to transport layer Æ
Higher delays
– Better to perform at the MAC layer
• Mechanisms needed to reduce packet loss rate
experienced by upper layers
Solution: to improve reliability is MACAW
• When node B receives a data packet from node A, node B
sends an Acknowledgement (Ack). This approach adopted in
many protocols [Bharghavan94,IEEE 802.11]
• If node A fails to receive an Ack, it will retransmit the packet
The Incompleteness of the RTS-CTS Method (1)
The Incompleteness of the RTS-CTS Method (2)
• Does it solve hidden terminals ?
– Assuming carrier sensing zone = communication
zone

E RTS
F
CTS
CTS
A B C D

E does not receive CTS successfully  Can later initiate transmission to D.

Hidden terminal problem remains.
 Thoughts !
• 802.11 does not solve HT/ET completely
– Only alleviates the problem through RTS/CTS and
recommends larger CS zone
• Large CS zone aggravates exposed terminals
– Spatial reuse reduces  A tradeoff
– RTS/CTS packets also consume bandwidth
– Moreover, backing off mechanism is also wasteful
The search for the best MAC protocol is still on.
However, 802.11 is being optimized too. Thus,
wireless MAC research still alive
Read articles on Hidden and exposed terminal
39
problems
Polling mechanisms
If one terminal can be heard by all others, this “central” terminal
(a.k.a. base station) can poll all other terminals according to a
certain scheme
➢ now all schemes known from fixed networks can be used (typical
mainframe - terminal scenario)
Example: Randomly Addressed Polling
➢ base station signals readiness to all mobile terminals
➢ terminals ready to send can now transmit a random number without
collision with the help of CDMA or FDMA (the random number can be
seen as dynamic address)
➢ the base station now chooses one address for polling from the list of all
random numbers (collision if two terminals choose the same address)
➢ the base station acknowledges correct packets and continues polling
the next terminal
➢ this cycle starts again after polling all terminals of the list
ISMA (Inhibit Sense Multiple Access)

Current state of the medium is signaled via a “busy tone”

➢ the base station signals on the downlink (base station to terminals) if
the medium is free or not
➢ terminals must not send if the medium is busy
➢ terminals can access the medium as soon as the busy tone stops
➢ the base station signals collisions and successful transmissions via the
busy tone and acknowledgements, respectively (media access is not
coordinated within this approach)
➢ mechanism used, e.g.,
for cellular digital packet data
in the Advanced Mobile Phone
System.
Access method CDMA
CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access)
• all terminals send on same frequency at the same time using ALL the
bandwidth of transmission channel
• each sender has a unique random number, sender XORs the signal
with this random number
• the receiver can “tune” into this signal if it knows the pseudo random
number
Disadvantages:
• higher complexity of a receiver (receiver cannot just listen into the
medium and start receiving if there is a signal)
• all signals should have the same strength at a receiver
Advantages:
• all terminals can use the same frequency, no planning needed
• huge code space (e.g. 232) compared to frequency space
• interference (e.g. white noise) is not coded
• forward error correction and encryption can be easily integrated
 Comparison SDMA/TDMA/FDMA/CDMA
Approach SDMA TDMA FDMA CDMA
Idea segment space into segment sending segment the spread the spectrum
cells/sectors time into disjoint frequency band into using orthogonal codes
time-slots, demand disjoint sub-bands
driven or fixed
patterns
Terminals only one terminal can all terminals are every terminal has its all terminals can be active
be active in one active for short own frequency, at the same place at the
cell/one sector periods of time on uninterrupted same moment,
the same frequency uninterrupted
Signal cell structure, directed synchronization in filtering in the code plus special
separation antennas the time domain frequency domain receivers

Advantages very simple, increases established, fully simple, established, flexible, less frequency
capacity per km² digital, flexible robust planning needed, soft
handover
Dis- inflexible, antennas guard space inflexible, complex receivers, needs
advantages typically fixed needed (multipath frequencies are a more complicated power
propagation), scarce resource control for senders
synchronization
difficult
Comment only in combination standard in fixed typically combined still faces some problems,
with TDMA, FDMA or networks, together with TDMA higher complexity,
CDMA useful with FDMA/SDMA (frequency hopping lowered expectations; will
used in many patterns) and SDMA be integrated with
mobile networks (frequency reuse) TDMA/FDMA
 Summary
• Designing MAC protocols for networks is very
difficult
– Issues to consider:
• Hidden/exposed terminal
• Collision avoidance
• Congestion control
• Reliability
• To be discussed in detail in chapter 6
– Fairness
– Energy efficiency
– IEEE 802.11 DCF (RTS/CTS/DATA/ACK) widely used,
but many other protocols are proposed
 Readings
• Jochen Schiller, Mobile Communications,
Section 7.3, Addison-Wesley, 2000.
• C. K. Toh, Ad Hoc Mobile Wireless Networks,
“Chapter 4 – Ad Hoc Wireless Media
Protocols”, Prentice Hall
• Bob O’Hara and Al Petrick, IEEE 802.11
Handbook: A Designer’s Companion, IEEE
Press, 1999.
 Further Readings
• Lots of MAC protocols published in Mobicom, Infocom, Globecom, ICC,
Mobihoc, WCNC, VTC,
etc.
• CSMA: L. Kleinrock and F. A. Tobagi, “Packet Switching in Radio Channels: Part I
– Carrier Sense Multiple Access Modes and Their Throughput Delay
Characteristics, IEEE Trans. On Communications, Vol. COM-23, No. 12, Dec.
1975, pp. 1400-1416
• MACA: P. Karn, “MACA – A New Channel Access Protocol for Packet Radio”,
ARRL/CRRL Amateur Radio 9th Computer Networking Conference, 1990, pp.
134-140. 2-4
• FAMA: C. L. Fullmer and J. J. Garcia-Luna_Aceves, “Floor Acquisition Multiple
Acsess (FAMA) for Packet-Radio Networks”, Proceedings of ACM Sigcomm’95,
Cambridge, MA, Aug. 1995, pp. 262-273.
• MACAW: V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenkerand L. Zhang, “MACAW: A Media
Access Protocol for Wireless LANs”, Proceedings of ACM Sigcomm’94, London,
UK, Sept. 1994, pp. 212-225.
• IEEE Computer Society LAN/MAN Standards Committee, “Wireless LAN Medium
Access
Protocol (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications, “IEEE Std. 802.11
?