A multi-access technique for broadband wireless local networks

This paper presents a new multi-access technique that allows multimedia information to be transported in indoor wireless networks. Growing emphasis on multimedia calls for the development of multi-access protocols capable of supporting demanding applications such as audio/video playback, image browsing, real-time voice/video transmission and interactive data exchange in a unified manner. To this end, a practical multi-access scheme called 'reserved polling' is proposed. The technique handles a diverse mixture of delay classes and message priorities associated with multimedia traffic with an inherent ability to adapt to the traffic load profile. In order to gain a quantitative insight into its behavior, the protocol is analyzed and simulated in detail. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.