Slot-Time Optimization Scheme for Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Abstract

Compared to a terrestrial communication, the high BER(Bit Error Ratio) and low channel bandwidth are the major factor of throughput degradation due to characteristics of underwater channel. Therefore, a MAC protocol must be designed to solve this problem in UWASNs(Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks). MAC protocols for UWASNs can be classified into two major types according to the contention scheme(Contention-free scheme and Contention-based scheme). In large scale of sensor networks, a Contention-based scheme is commonly used due