  In this paper a candidate protocol to replace the prevalent CSMA/CA medium
access control in Wireless Local Area Networks is presented. The proposed
protocol can achieve higher throughput than CSMA/CA, while maintaining
fairness, and without additional implementation complexity. Under certain
circumstances, it is able to reach and maintain collision-free operation, even
when the number of contenders is variable and potentially large. It is backward
compatible, allowing for new and legacy stations to coexist without degrading
one another's performance, a property that can make the adoption process by
future versions of the standard smooth and inexpensive.
