Cluster and probability competition based MAC scheme in power line communications

Efficiency of MAC (media access control) is one of important issues of power line communication (PLC). There exists efficiency problem in current CSMA/CA (Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance) mechanism of large-scale PLC network. Aimed to solve this problem, a Cluster and Probability Competition Based MAC (CP-MAC) mechanism is presented to improve the MAC efficiency, in which the network is divided into clusters and competition is conducted among clusters using the probability-function. Finally the simulation results show that the CP-MAC is able to improve the LPLC network performance in term of packet loss rate, throughout and delay.