Angular MAC protocol for wireless ad hoc networks with smart antennas

In this paper, a new medium access protocol is proposed for enhancing the performance of Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) by the use of smart antennas. This new protocol makes use of the Direction of Arrival (DoA) algorithm. In order to apply beam forming with smart antennas, the location of the receiver needs to be correctly determined. For this purpose, using Global Positioning System (GPS) equipment has been proposed previously. However, the GPS system that uses satellites cannot be applied for WLANs that are most of the time deployed in indoor environments. Therefore, in this paper, we are proposing a Direction Finding (DF) algorithm through which, stations exchange training messages with each other to determine their respective locations. With the help of this algorithm, a new MAC protocol based on IEEE 802.11 WLAN standard is proposed to coordinate the communication between the stations in a WLAN with smart antennas. The goal of the proposed protocol is to maximize the performance of WLANs, by making use of Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) properties and Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA).