Presentation Outline

Introduction
B-MAC Implementation
Versatile Low Power Media Access for B-MAC Results
Wireless Sensor Networks
Critique
Comparison
Presented By: Eitan Marder-Eppstein

Why is B-MAC Needed? B-MAC's Idea of MAC for WSN

S-MAC and T-MAC: B-MAC: A carrier sense media access protocol for wireless
sensor networks
No flexibility – What if network conditions change?
Too much code – Limited memory on motes B-MAC Goals:
Doesn't scale well – As network size increases, nodes must maintain more Low Power Operation
schedules Effective Collision Avoidance
Well... there's also WiseMAC: Simple Implementation, Small Code and RAM Size
Has no mechanism to reconfigure based on services using the protocol Efficient Channel Utilization Regardless of Data Rate
Motivated by needs of monitoring applications Reconfigurable by Network Protocols
Tolerant to Changing Network Conditions
Highly Scalable

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B-MAC Implementation B-MAC Implementation

Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance Clear Channel Assessment (CCA)
Listen for a pre-determined amount of time for network activity
Ambient noise changes
If the network is idle then send a packet depending on environment
If activity is detected then wait for a random amount of time (called backoff B-MAC employs software
factor) before re-attempting transmission to estimate the noise floor
Backoff counter only decremented when channel is clear Search for outliers
significantly below the noise
Receiver Could Exist floor since a valid packet
could never have one
Backoff Set Sender D Hidden Terminal If clear then transmit
If busy then backoff
A B C F
Backoff Set
5 ,4,3
E

2,1,0
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B-MAC Implementation B-MAC Implementation

Low Power Listening (LPL) B-MAC = Link Protocol

When a node awakes it checks for radio activity using CCA
If activity is detected, stay awake to receive the packet and then sleep
If no packet (false positive) timeout forces node to sleep
Preamble Length
Preamble must be at least as long as duty cycle for reliable data
reception
Wake Up
Only a small core of media access functionality included with B-MAC
Network services (organization, synchronization, routing) built above B-MAC
What about Hidden Terminal, Fragmentation, etc?
No “built in” mechanisms for handling these
Instead, B-MAC exposes a set of interfaces to allow services to tune B-MAC
Protocols built on B-MAC can optimize performance in their environment

Interface MacControl{ Interface LowPowerListening{

EnableCCA();/DisableCCA(); Set/GetListeningMode();
Sender Receiver Receiver EnableAck();/DisableAck(); Set/GetTransmitMode();
HaltTx(); Set/GetPreambleLength();
A B Preamble Data
} Set/GetCheckInterval();
100ms 100ms Interface MacBackoff{ }
Preamble Duty Cycle Sender initial/congestionBackoff();
}

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B-MAC Implementation B-MAC – Adjusting Parameters

Link Layer Acknowledgment Calculate Optimal Parameters

If enabled, B-MAC transfers an ack code after receiving a unicast packet Specifically, minimize a node's energy consumption to maximize lifetime
Small Code Size Solve system of 6 equations to find minimum energy consumption for a

ROM and RAM limited given network configuration:

Small code size important

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B-MAC – Results B-MAC – Results

Shows trade off of more

frequently checking the
radio to shorten packet
transmission time

Penalty for idle listening

is much more severe than
sending packets that are
longer than necessary

Node lifetime in years based on How duty cycle is affected by

LPL check time and network density network density and LPL interval

If both neighbourhood size and Best check interval is lowest line at

check interval are known, their a given network density
intersection gives expected lifetime
using optimal parameters
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B-MAC – Protocol Comparison Results - Latency/Energy Critique

B-MAC to WiseMAC Comparison

After talk of WiseMAC as the only serious competitor to B-MAC at the
release date of this paper, the authors neglect to test against it.
Is scheduling always a bad thing
B-MAC does away with synchronization between nodes, but does this
always improve performance. Is there a better way to schedule.
Energy Floor for LPL
The authors of the paper mention that there is an energy floor for LPL.
Doesn’t this mean that for a network with high latency constraints B-MAC
is not the most energy efficient protocol. In fact, results from the paper
confirm that S-MAC uses less energy than B-MAC at high latency.
Optimizing for Average Conditions: What if they often change?

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Comparison and Questions B-MAC – Protocol Comparison Results - Throughput

SCP
Synchronize the entire network in an effective and efficient manner
Eliminate the long preamble associated with LPL
Adapts well to variable traffic loads
Reduce duty cycle from 1-2% for current MAC protocols to 0.1%

?
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B-MAC – Protocol Comparison Results - Fragmentation

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