A power efficient MAC protocol for implant device communication in Wireless Body Area Networks

Applications of sensor networks in healthcare have undergone major changes in recent times. Implanted wireless sensor devices inside the human body to monitor the activities are a reality now. A new field called the Wireless Body Area Networks (WBAN or BAN) has emerged as a hot research area. To fulfill the needs for a common standard and solve the issues in this emerging field, IEEE has proposed a new task group, the IEEE 802.15.6 TG6. To control the communications from implanted devices in both PHY and MAC point of view is still a major challenge. An efficient MAC protocol can help manage and control the communication. In this paper, we propose one such MAC protocol to control the communication in implant devices. Our method of using wakeup table for normal communication and radio based wakeup for emergency communication is found to be efficient in terms of energy consumption, and delay.