Performance Analysis And Research Of IEEE 1901 Medium Access Control Protocol For Power-line Communication Networks

With the breakthrough of Power-line communication(PLC)technology,PLC network has easier connectivity and higher data rate.At present,it has become one of the best alternatives for realizing intelligence and automatic of home network systems and constructing Industrial Internet of things(Io T),and achieved great commercial success.Since IEEE 1901 protocol,used by medium access control(MAC)layer has an important impact on PLC network's performance,industry and standard organization have paid more attention to IEEE 1901 protocol standard based embedded devices and chips and vigorously promoted their application in recent years.Different from IEEE802.X protocols used in wireless networks,the CSMA/CA(carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance)mechanism of 1901 protocol uses not only a backoff counter process but also a “so called” deferral counter process.Compared with 802.X protocols,IEEE 1901 protocol has larger state space and more complicated state transition process.Accordingly,making performance analysis for 1901 protocol remains a great challenge.Up to now,more and more works began to concentrate on studying PLC network's IEEE 1901 MAC protocol.However,among these works,we note the studies focusing on 1901 protocol performance analysis have the following drawbacks.Firstly,most of them used Renewal theory and strong law of large number(SLLN)as the mathematical support to construct performance analysis model of 1901 protocol.However,it's not easy to express the detailed process of state transition for 1901 protocol through using Renewal theory.Meanwhile,they assumed PLC networks operate in a saturated and homogeneous traffic environment,and neglected the impact of finite buffer size on PLC MAC performance.Secondly,these works were valid only for the single-hop environment.In other words,the performance of IEEE 1901 protocol in the multi-hop environment,considering the impacts of hidden terminal,relay traffic and time overlap phenomenon is still not verified and analyzed.Finally,although radio frequency energy transfer(RET)technology has been introduced as a promising energy harvesting(EH)method to supply power in both wireless communication(WLC)and PLC systems.Current EH MAC protocols were proposed only for WLC systems.Therefore,how to utilize RET technology to modify the IEEE 1901 protocol of PLC MAC layer,which can use the radio frequency signal to provide transmission power and the PLC medium to finish the data transmission(realizing the “cooperative communication”)remains a challenge.Focusing on the above problems,it is necessary for us to make a more insightful and detailed analysis of IEEE 1901 protocol for PLC networks,and accomplish protocol optimization and design.Thus,based on Markov stochastic process and Queueing theory,we accomplished the following four works:(1)We put forward a unified performance analysis model of IEEE 1901 protocol for single-hop,unsaturated PLC networks.In the modeling process,a multi-layer discrete Markov chain(ML DMC)model is constructed to depict the working principle of 1901's CSMA/CA mechanism under the single-hop environment.The queueing process of the station buffer is captured by using Queueing theory.On the basis,we present a strict performance analysis framework for IEEE 1901 protocol under heterogeneous traffic conditions.Since the proposed performance analysis model is scalable,it can be also used to analyze the performance of 1901 protocol in saturated conditions.Extensive simulations show that the proposed model can accurately analyze the performance of 1901 protocol for single-hop,unsaturated PLC networks,no matter under homogeneous or heterogeneous traffic conditions.This work has a relatively significant inspiration value in further optimizing the MAC layer performance of PLC networks,and designing the hybrid MAC protocol.(2)We propose a performance analysis model for IEEE 1901 protocol in multihop PLC networks.Besides considering the impacts of deferral counter process of1901,buffer size,we also comprehensively consider the impacts of multi-hop environment,relay traffic,hidden terminal problem and time overlap phenomenon on1901 performance.The modeling analysis process is divided into two parts.In the local modeling analysis part,we construct a brand new Markov chain model,i.e.,two dimension discrete Markov chain(2D DMC)model to describe the CSMA/CA mechanism of IEEE 1901 protocol under the multi-hop environment.In the coupling queueing modeling analysis part,we employ Jackson queueing system to analyze the packet transmission procedure between successive hops.On the basis,we derive the closed-form expressions of station throughput,medium access delay,packet blocking probability,end-to-end successful transmission delay and goodput of 1901 protocol under the multi-hop environment.Through extensive simulations,we evaluate the MAC performance of IEEE 1901 protocol in the multi-hop environment,and verify the accuracy of the proposed performance analysis model.This work provides parameter basement and theoretical guidance for designing HACS(home access communication systems),and further optimizing the MAC layer performance of multi-hop PLC networks.(3)We design a RET based EH MAC protocol for PLC systems i.e.,RET-PLC MAC.Firstly,we improve the standard PLC frame sequence by adding consultation control and confirmation occupy space frames,so that the station,having occupied the PLC medium can get suitable harvested energy,and the PLC system can be operated in an on-demand,self-sustainable manner.On the basis,we present the detailed working principle of RET-PLC MAC.Next,we establish a two-dimension three states discrete Markov chain(2D3S DMC)analysis model to make performance evaluation for RETPLC MAC.The concept of RET-PLC MAC's Qo I(quality of information)is introduced in this model.Moreover,we deduce the global optimal solutions of system throughput and expected Qo I.Through extensive simulations,we characterize the performance of RET-PLC MAC under different system parameters,and verify the correctness of this analysis model.The implemented cooperative communication mechanism in this study provides method and design foundation for further optimizing EH MAC protocol of PLC networks.(4)We prove the theoretical completeness for performance analysis of IEEE 1901 protocol.Firstly,based on the 2D DMC model,we use differential method and fixed point theory to prove the monotonicity of our proposed IEEE 1901 performance analysis models.Next,we demonstrate the MAC metrics of unsaturated 1901 protocol(system throughput and successful transmission probability)have bound performance.Finally,with the help of Kolomogorov equation,we prove that IEEE 1901 protocol has a stable structure in unsaturated conditions.This work provides rigorous theoretical basis and support for performance analysis and research of IEEE 1901 protocol.