Delay-Reliability Trade-off in MIMO-Enabled IEEE 802.11-Based Wireless Sensor and Actuator Networks

Abstract One of the main challenges in Wireless Sensor and Actuator Networks (WSAN) is the delay caused by shared and nondeterministic behavior of wireless communication medium. The Retry-Limit parameter of IEEE 802.11 standard can be used to control packet reliability, whereas other parameters mostly effect on the packet delay. In this paper, at first the delay-reliability trade-off in WSANs based on MIMO-Enabled IEEE 802.11 standard, utilizing Enhanced Distributed Channel Access (EDCA) at Medium Access Control (MAC) layer and Maximum Likelihood Spatial Multiplexing at PHYsical (PHY) Layer is studied. Then two simple adaptive schemes have been proposed to minimize packet delay while satisfying the required reliability at noisy factory environment.