Abstract
•Our protocol predicts the robustness-level of available channels at a particular epoch i.e. grade available channels for determining local preferred channels under channel quality and stability analysis. Afterwards, the best among LPCs may be selected (under some QoS criteria) by each communicating node-pair (point-to-point link) for stream-based communication in WSNs.•Being semi-dynamic natured, our protocol is suitable for high data rate applications such as stream-based communication being carried out in a highly varying environment, exhibiting stability at-least for short time intervals.•By employing a dynamic channel blacklisting criteria, our protocol progressively minimizes the channel selection probability of an unhealthy channel for ensuring high performance communication.•Our protocol is capable of handling accidental jamming on a channel executing stream-based communication.
Considering both channel quality and stability may enhance the likelihood of optimum channel decision for stream-based communication. Good quality stable channels may maintain a particular quality level during data stream transmission and thereby minimize channel switching overheads such as switching delay, energy consumption, and the associated data loss. Among the published multichannel MAC protocols for WSNs, only a few consider channel quality before assigning wireless channels. Whereas to the best of our knowledge, only few contemplates both channel quality and stability during stream-based communication, however, not very suitable for varying (noisy) environment. To bridge this gap, this work proposes a novel dynamic Multichannel Adaptive approach for Grading Immediate Channels (MAGIC). The MAGIC protocol may predict and classify the available channels under channel quality and stability assessment methodology and determines Local Preferred Channels (LPCs) in a noisy environment. Afterwards, the best among those channels may be selected (under some QoS criteria) for stream-based communication in WSNs. The proposed MAGIC algorithm minimizes channel processing overheads by considering only non-blacklisted channels during a communication session. Simulation results show that the MAGIC algorithm achieves better performance than the counterparts in terms of channel switching delay, energy consumption, and the associated throughput loss.