METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SYNCHRONIZED COMMUNICATION OVER WIRELESS BACKBONE STRUCTURE

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide wireless communication among a plurality of nodes and repeaters that are synchronized for communication with a central hub that constitutes a master repeater. SOLUTION: Wireless communication is disposed among a plurality of repeaters (12-18) to synchronously communicate with a central master repeater 11. The repeaters (11-18) constitute a wireless backbone network and frequency hopping is used to automatically establish synchronization despite dynamic changes in a wireless network (100). A repeater (12-18), when introduced to the network, automatically scans for, and synchronizes to the other repeater (12-18), while at the same time continuing to listen for other repeater signals (200) which identify either the master repeater (11) or the other repeater (12-18) which is closer to the master repeater so as to communicate with the master repeater (11) through a more direct communication link (19). COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT