Evaluation of priority and scheduling schemes for an IEEE 802.14 MAC protocol loaded by real traffic

We study a new scheme for provision of priorities within the framework of a MAC protocol which is a potential candidate of the (as yet unpublished) IEEE 802.14 standard. A comprehensive simulation study, based on real traffic traces, shows that this new method provides better protection for the high priority traffic than an earlier proposed scheme. Except for physical and MAC layer overheads, the scheme exhibits comparable behaviour to that of an ideal multiplexer, for traces with very diverse correlation structures. The significance of using realistic (correlated) traffic streams for modelling purposes is demonstrated and discussed.