IEEE802.15.4

This standard defines the protocol and interconnection of devices via radio communication in a personal area network (PAN). The standard uses carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA-CA) medium access mechanism and supports star as well as peer-to-peer topologies. The media access is contention based; however, using the optional superframe structure, time slots can be allocated by the PAN coordinator to devices with time critical data. Connectivity to higher performance networks is provided through a PAN coordinator.