Energy Efficient MAC Protocols with Adaptive Duty Cycle for Wireless Sensor Networks

In Wireless Sensor Networks due to limited energy and resources it is very important to conserve energy and improve utilization of its resources by reducing latency. In this paper we focus on Medium Access Control protocols proposed to adapt towards more efficient use of energy and decreasing latency. We discuss how protocols like DMAC, T-MAC, DSMAC, AREA-MAC and adaptable CSMA/CA MAC work on sleep duration, decreasing idle listening and overhearing, and collision of packets. These protocols enhance their channel adaptation methods for varying traffic conditions, providing a tradeoff between various parameters like energy conservation, throughput, fairness and latency. Additionally we compare all these protocols based on their various assumptions and metric parameters. Finally, we discuss advantages and disadvantages of some of these protocols to provide an insight for their favorability under various environments.