A cluster-based multichannel MAC protocol for throughput sensitive applications in VANETs

The IEEE 1609.4 protocol adopts the alternating channel access mechanism, in which the synchronization interval is separated into control channel interval and service channel interval. The vehicles can only exchange the control information in control channel interval and the service information in service channel interval separately, but the wireless resource could not be used efficiently. In this paper, we introduce the concept of cluster and propose a new mechanism based on TDMA. In our scheme, vehicles are grouped into clusters and each cluster elects a cluster head as the dedicated central controller of the cluster. The cluster head is responsible to consolidate, forward the message sent by the cluster members and schedule transmission slots for them, thus the cluster members can use the control channel interval for service traffic and efficiently improve the throughput of non-safety message. The simulation results show that the proposed MAC protocol achieves higher packet deliver ratio and throughput for the service data.