A novel MAC protocol for industrial WLAN: Hardware aspects

The tutorial introduces a novel Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol for industrial Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs). This protocol provides the ultra-low network latency with a target upper bound in the order of 1 ms while maintaining a high network reliability and availability. The novelty of the proposed wireless MAC protocol resides in its similar latency performance as its counterpart in industrial wired LANs. First, the functional design of the MAC protocol is described. Then, its performance results gained from a hardware implementation (SystemC and VHDL) on an FPGA platform are presented. Architecture and implementation details of the MAC processor including system simulation and test procedures are described. Finally, a real-time communication module which achieves the ultra-low latency required in industrial automation is presented.