Performance analysis of a PRMA protocol suitable for voice and data transmissions in low Earth orbit mobile satellite systems

Mobile satellite systems (MSSs) are expected to play a significant role in providing users with communication services worldwide. In such context, low earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellations seem to be a good solution to attain a global coverage and to allow the use of low-power lightweight mobile terminals. This paper analyzes the performance of a novel medium access control (MAC) scheme suitable for applications in LEO-MSSs, named Packet Reservation Multiple Access with Hindering States (PRMA-HS), that has been derived by proper modifications of the well-known PRMA protocol. We envisage a mixed traffic with voice sources and data sources with different quality of service (QoS) requirements. The good behavior of the proposed PRMA-HS scheme is validated by extensive comparisons with the classical PRMA protocol. Finally, it is shown here that PRMA-HS efficiently supports integrated voice and data traffics in LEO-MSSs.