A MAC Protocol Taking Account of Permissible Latency for Real-Time Applications

Wireless networks with very low latency are desired for users to enjoy real-time applications without stress to users. The authors have been studying to realize an ultra low-latency mobile network and concluded that a medium access control (MAC) protocol is a key component for the realization. This paper proposes a MAC protocol suitable for delay-sensitive real-time applications. Numerical results from simulation studies demonstrate that, for instance, the proposed MAC protocol can accommodate more than 50% of the traffic compared to the IEEE 802.11 distributed coordination function (DCF) for a real-time application service. In addition, simulation results revealed that the proposed MAC protocol provides very short delay jitter, which is one of the crucial performance measures for real-time applications, regardless of traffic loads.