Performance analysis of IEEE 802.15.4 MAC protocol with ACK frame transmission

A common way of achieving reliable data transmission in wireless sensor network applications is by using a retransmission mechanism with medium access control (MAC) level acknowledgements. The IEEE 802.15.4 standard, which is widely acknowledged as the state-of-the-art PHY/MAC standard for wireless sensor networks, supports MAC-level acknowledgements and retransmissions. In this paper, based on a three-dimensional discrete-time Markov chain, we propose a new analytical model to analyse the performance of the IEEE 802.15.4 MAC protocol with retransmission and MAC level acknowledgements under unsaturated traffic conditions. Further, we present a simplified version of the proposed analytical model with some approximations. Using the proposed analytical models, we evaluate the network performance in terms of the aggregate channel throughput, average power consumption of a node, frame discard ratio, and frame delivery ratio. The analytical results are substantiated through ns−2 simulations. The effects of the frame arrival rate, number of nodes, frame length and various MAC parameters, on the performance of the network are discussed. The results of both analytical models are compared and it is shown that the simplified model provides an acceptable accuracy with less computational complexity.