A Short Preamble Cognitive MAC Protocol in Cognitive Radio Sensor Networks

Cognitive radio provides a promising solution to reliable and time-efficient wireless sensor networks. However, cognitive capability brings a quite challenging issue to energy-constrained cognitive radio sensor networks (CRSNs) since large energy consumption is required for spectrum sensing and opportunistic access. Medium access control (MAC) is critical for cognitive sensors due to its influence on energy-consuming transceivers. This work proposes a short preamble cognitive MAC (SPC-MAC) protocol for CRSNs. The major contribution of SPC-MAC is the smart combination of short preamble sampling and opportunistic forwarding. As a result, SPC-MAC could support reliable and fast spectrum access while reducing energy consumption. Furthermore, SPC-MAC is a distributed cognitive MAC protocol without requiring any common control channels. The protocol modeling for SPC-MAC is performed rigorously. The analytical and simulation results validate the superior performance of SPC-MAC.