The Impact of Distance between Neighboring WBANs on IEEE 802.15.6 Performances

The improved living conditions in the world generally and developing nations in particular, have driven an increase in life expectancy, which has led to a rise in the rate of population ageing. This will overload healthcare structures, which will significantly escalate healthcare costs, creating the need to incorporate intelligent and pro-active healthcare solutions known as wireless body area networks. However, such networks may be prone to mutual interference when located in a space containing several additional WBANs. The purpose of this paper is to investigate this phenomenon through a simulation involving two adjacent BANs, and to examine the impact of the variation in distance between them on the performance of one of the two in terms of packet loss rate (PLR) and throughput. We have done this study for the two models of path loss described in the IEEE 802.15.6 standard, called CM3A and CM3B, at 2. 4GHz. Simulations are carried out using the open source platform Castalia 3.3. The findings of the study have shown that as the distance between adjacent BANs decreases the PLR is more important, and throughput becomes lower.