Cognitive Bidirectional Buffer-Aided DF Relay Networks: Protocol design and Power Allocation

In this paper, we consider bidirectional decode-and-forward buffer-aided relay selection and transmission power allocation schemes for underlay cognitive radio relay networks. First, a low complexity delay-constrained bidirectional relaying protocol is proposed. The proposed protocol maximizes the single-hop normalized sum of the primary network (PN) and secondary network (SN) rates and controls the maximum packet delay caused by physical layer buffering at relays. Second, optimal transmission power expressions that maximize the single-hop normalized sum rate are derived for each possible transmission mode. Simulation results are provided to evaluate the performance of the proposed relaying protocol and transmission power allocation scheme and compare their performance with that of the optimal scenario. Additionally, the impacts of several system parameters including maximum buffer size, interference threshold, maximum packet delay and number of relays on the network performance are also investigated. The results reveal that the proposed bidirectional relaying protocol and antenna transmission power allocation schemes introduce a satisfactory performance with much lower complexity compared to the optimal relay selection and power allocation schemes and provide an application dependent delay-controlling mechanism. It is also found that the network performance degrades as the delay constraint is more restricted until it matches the performance of conventional unbuffered relaying with delay constraints of three. Additionally, findings show that using buffer-aided relaying significantly enhances the SN performance while slightly weakens the performance of the PN.     

基于部分中继选择的能量收集双跳网络信息年龄优化

针对传统中继协作网络传感器节点能量受限导致信息传输延迟较高的问题,将短包通信（SPC）和能量收集技术相结合,构建了一种双跳中继无线传感器网络模型。网络中源节点和中继均需从专用能量基站收集射频信号能量以保证信息的持续传输,中继采用半双工解码转发协议将源节点发送的状态更新信息以短包形式传递到目的节点,利用中继选择策略与最大比合并技术提出了基于时效性的最早部分中继选择方案。考虑该网络信息的新鲜度,首先,分析了SPC传输性能,推导了中继和目的节点处的平均包错误率。其次,利用顺序统计量描述了源节点到中继端数据包的重传次数,基于更新过程理论推导了网络的平均信息年龄（AoI）表达式,并采用梯度下降方法优化了影响网络平均AoI的部分参数。最后,仿真分析结果表明,优化中继数量和数据包长度可以有效提高网络信息新鲜度,同时,通过对比优化部分参数得到的最优值与贪婪方法得到的最小化平均AoI理论值,可以验证部分中继协作方案在双跳状态更新网络中的可行性。      

Delay Optimal Scheduling in a Two-Hop Vehicular Relay Network

We study a scheduling problem in a wireless network where vehicles are used as store-and-forward relays, a situation that might arise, for example, in practical rural communication networks. A fixed source node wants to transfer a file to a fixed destination node, located beyond its communication range. In the absence of any infrastructure connecting the two nodes, we consider the possibility of communication using vehicles passing by. Vehicles arrive at the source node at renewal instants and are known to travel towards the destination node with average speed v sampled from a given probability distribution. The source node communicates data packets (or fragments) of the file to the destination node using these vehicles as relays. We assume that the vehicles communicate with the source node and the destination node only, and hence, every packet communication involves two hops. In this setup, we study the source node’s sequential decision problem of transferring packets of the file to vehicles as they pass by, with the objective of minimizing delay in the network. We study both the finite file size case and the infinite file size case. In the finite file size case, we aim to minimize the expected file transfer delay, i.e., expected value of the maximum of the packet sojourn times. In the infinite file size case, we study the average packet delay minimization problem as well as the optimal tradeoff achievable between the average queueing delay at the source node buffer and the average transit delay in the relay vehicle.     

Performance of new relay selection scheme for buffer-assisted multihop decode-and-forward networks

In this paper, a new relay selection scheme is proposed to reduce the end-to-end packet delivery delay for buffer-assisted multihop decode-and-forward cooperative networks. The proposed method selects a relay node having more packets in the associated buffer and relay's proximity to the destination node. Mathematical expressions for the outage probability and average packet delay in Rician fading are obtained by modeling the system as a Markov chain. The proposed relay selection scheme has less packet delay as compared to the max-link relay selection scheme with marginally higher outage probability. Thus, the proposed relay selection scheme is a good alternative to low latency wireless applications.     

Transmission scheduling in a multi‐channel wireless network with bidirectional relaying links

Using network coding in a wireless network can potentially improve the network throughput. On the other hand, it increases the complexity of resource allocations as the quality of one transmission is affected by the link conditions of the transmitter to multiple receivers. In this work, we study time slot scheduling and channel allocations jointly for a network with bidirectional relaying links, where the two end nodes of each link can exchange data through a relay node. Two scenarios are considered when the relay node forwards packets to the end nodes. In the first scenario, the relay node always forwards network‐coded packets to both end nodes simultaneously; in the second scenario, the relay node opportunistically uses network coding for two‐way relaying and traditional one‐way relaying. For each scenario, an optimization problem is first formulated for maximizing the total network throughput. The optimum scheduling is not causal because it requires future information of channel conditions. We then propose heuristic scheduling schemes. The slot‐based scheduling maximizes the total transmission rate of all the nodes at each time slot, and the node‐based scheduling schedules transmissions based on achievable transmission rates of individual nodes at different channels. The node‐based one has lower complexity than the slot‐based one. Our results indicate that although the node‐based scheduling achieves slightly lower throughput than the slot‐based one, both the proposed scheduling schemes are very effective in the sense that the difference between their throughput and the optimum scheduling is relatively small in different network settings. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Group random-access disciplines for multi-access broadcast channels

A group random-access (GILA) control discipline for a multi-access communication channel is presented and studied. A GILA scheme uses only certain channel time periods to allow some network terminals to transmit their information-bearing packets on a random-access basis. The channel can thus be utilized at other times to grant access to other terminals or other message types, by applying as appropriate group random-access, reservation, or fixed access-control procedures. GILA schemes could also be utilized to provide channel access to various network protocol packets. The average packet delay under a GRA discipline is evaluated by a Markov ratio limit theorem. To stabilize the channel, the GRA procedure is controlled dynamically by a control policy that rejects any newly arriving packets within certain time periods. Studying the associated Markov decision problem, the optimal control policy is characterized as yielding a minimal average packet delay under a prescribed maximal packet probability of rejection. This policy is shown to be represented by a single-threshold scheme. For such a scheme, a threshold value that attains the minimum probability of rejection is shown to exist and to yield a desirable control procedure. Performance curves are presented to demonstrate the delay-throughput characteristics induced by GRA procedures.     

On Broadcast Stability of Queue-Based Dynamic Network Coding Over Erasure Channels

The transmission of packets is considered from one source to multiple receivers over single-hop erasure channels. The objective is to evaluate the stability properties of different transmission schemes with and without network coding. First, the throughput limitation of retransmission schemes is discussed and the stability benefits are shown for randomly coded transmissions, which, however, need not optimize the stable throughput for finite coding field size and finite packet block size. Next, a dynamic scheme is introduced for distributing packets among virtual queues depending on the channel feedback and performing linear network coding based on the instantaneous queue contents. The difference of the maximum stable throughput from the min-cut rate is bounded as function of the order of erasure probabilities depending on the complexity allowed for network coding and queue management. This queue-based network coding scheme can asymptotically optimize the stable throughput to the max-flow min-cut bound, as the erasure probabilities go to zero. This is realized for a finite coding field size without accumulating packet blocks at the source to start network coding. The comparison of random and queue-based dynamic network coding with plain retransmissions opens up new questions regarding the tradeoffs of stable throughput, packet delay, overhead, and complexity.      

Power efficient scheduling over fading channel for cross‐layer optimization

We consider the minimization of long‐term average power consumption for packet transmission between a mobile station and the base station over Nakagami‐m fading channel. Power consumption is minimized by intelligent transmission scheduling design, with the average queuing delay and joint packet loss across MAC and physical layers being confined below certain levels. The problem is formulated as an infinite horizon constrained Markov decision problem and solved by linear programming (LP) method. The primary intention of this paper is to provide a visible paradigm on using LP method to optimize the performance of mobile wireless communication systems. We elaborate the detailed mathematical solution with consistent simulation experiments and emphasize the effectiveness of adaptive transmission scheduling for cross‐layer QoS provisioning. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Link stability‐aware reliable packet transmitting mechanism in mobile ad hoc network

To guarantee the QoS of multimedia applications in a mobile ad hoc network (MANET), a reliable packet transmitting mechanism in MANET is proposed. In this paper, we introduce an effective link lifetime estimation scheme. According to the current network topology and corresponding estimated link lifetime, the end‐to‐end connection is established adaptively in the best effort manner. Consequently, utilizing the network coding method the relay node combines and forwards the packets on the working path. Furthermore, to keep the balance between the gain in reliability and the amount of redundant packets, the time for sending the redundant packets on the backup path is determined for the link stability intelligently. Simulations show that our mechanisms can provide reliable transmissions for data packets and enhance the performance of the entire network, such as the packet delivery ratio, the end‐to‐end delay and the number of control messages. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Improved multicast routing in MANETs using link stability and route stability

The growing popularity of multimedia applications and services needs to support several quality of service metrics such as high throughput, low energy, and jitter, which is a challenging task in mobile ad hoc networks. Because of limited bandwidth, energy constraints, dynamic topology, transmission errors, and fluctuating link stability, the links between adjacent nodes are often not reliable and may break because of node mobility. Link breakage initiates the process of rerouting either at the sender node (the node at which the link breaks) or at the source node. In either case, it leads to packet loss, delivery delays, and increased control overheads. Hence, to attain a minimum quality of service, routing protocols must address the dynamic network topology. Uncertain and varying movement of nodes necessitates stability of the links between such nodes. The objective of this paper is to propose 2 protocols, the first based on link stability and the other based on route stability. Link stability identifies a stable link from the available links to the next hop and determines a stable end‐to‐end route. The probability of successful transmission of periodic packets is used as a link stability metric to assess the stable path. Acknowledgment ‐free packets are used to check connectivity in the network. Increased probability of successful transmission implies that the selected link is sustained for longer duration and can deliver packets more reliably or, as a consequence, results in a stable link to deliver a better data rate. With a stable link, there is a reduced possibility of retransmissions, reduced end‐to‐end delay, reduced control overheads, and enhanced data delivery ratio. Selection of the most stable route for data transmission improves the performance. Experimental results from simulations performed on EXata/Cyber v2.0 simulator reveal that our proposed protocols are an improvement over the existing protocols in terms of packet delivery ratio, average end‐to‐end delay, and average route lifetime, even without route optimization with the minor increase in control packets. A case study of the application of proposed protocols is also presented.     

Output and delay process analysis for slotted CDMA wirelesscommunication networks with integrated voice/data transmission

This paper presents the output and delay process analysis of integrated voice/data slotted code division multiple access (CDMA) network systems with random access protocol for packet radio communications. The system model consists of a finite number of users, and each user can be a source of both voice traffic and data traffic. The allocation of codes to voice calls is given priority over that to data packets, while an admission control, which restricts the maximum number of codes available to voice sources, is considered for voice traffic so as not to monopolize the resource. Such codes allocated exclusively to voice calls are called voice codes. In addition, the system monitoring can distinguish between silent and talkspurt periods of voice sources, so that users with data packets can use the voice codes for transmission if the voice sources are silent. A discrete-time Markov process is used to model the system operation, and an exact analysis is presented to derive the moment generating functions of the probability distributions for packet departures of both voice and data traffic and for the data packet delay. For some cases with different numbers of voice codes, numerical results display the correlation coefficient of the voice and data packet departures and the coefficient of variation of the data packet delay as well as average performance measures, such as the throughput, the average delay of data packets, and the average blocking probability of voice calls     

Power allocation in OFDM cognitive radio relay networks with outdated channel state information

In this paper, we study power allocation in OFDM cognitive radio (CR) relay networks. The objective of power allocation is to maximize the instantaneous capacity of the CR network. It is assumed that the available channel state information between the secondary and primary users is an outdated but correlated version of the actual instantaneous channel state information. Optimal power allocation schemes are developed for both decode‐and‐forward and amplify‐and‐forward relay assisted CR transmission, assuming that the primary users are subject to average interference constraints and the CR transmitters are subject to maximum transmit power constraint. In addition, suboptimal power allocation schemes with reduced complexity are also proposed. Performance of the proposed schemes is compared with uniform power allocation and numerical results confirm that the proposed power allocation schemes achieve significant capacity improvement in comparison to uniform power loading. Furthermore, the proposed suboptimal power allocation schemes can be used as less complex alternatives for optimal power allocation with some capacity degradation. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Performance analysis of markov modulated IEEE 802.15.4 beacon-enable mode

In this paper, we study the throughput stability, mean queueing delay and energy consumption issues of IEEE 802.15.4 MAC protocol. We model the network as a multi-queue single-server system and derive the service time distribution of head-of-line packets from a Markov Chain of beacon-enable mode in an unsaturated traffic environment. Two transmission schemes of uplink traffic, the non-acknowledged transmission and acknowledged transmission, are studied with probabilistic exponential backoff scheduling algorithm. We obtain the characteristic equation of network throughput and power consumptions of each node in closed form, from which the stable throughput region and bounded mean delay region are specified with respect to the retransmission factor. Furthermore, we also show that the energy consumption of each node can be kept small within the stable throughput region. All analytical results presented in this paper are verified by simulations.     

Interleaved coding and sequential transmission scheme for packet‐level forward error correction over burst loss channels

Burst packet loss is a common problem over wired and wireless networks and leads to a significant reduction in the performance of packet‐level forward error correction (FEC) schemes used to recover packet losses during transmission. Traditional FEC interleaving methods adopt the sequential coding‐interleaved transmission (SCIT) process to encode the FEC packets sequentially and reorder the packet transmission sequence. Consequently, the burst loss effect can be mitigated at the expense of an increased end‐to‐end delay. Alternatively, the reversed interleaving scheme, namely, interleaved coding‐sequential transmission (ICST), performs FEC coding in an interleaved manner and transmits the packets sequentially based on their generation order in the application. In this study, the analytical FEC model is constructed to evaluate the performance of the SCIT and ICST schemes. From the analysis results, it can be observed that the interleaving delay of ICST FEC is reduced by transmitting the source packets immediately as they arrive from the application. Accordingly, an Enhanced ICST scheme is further proposed to trade the saved interleaving time for a greater interleaving capacity, and the corresponding packet loss rate can be minimized under a given delay constraint. The simulation results show that the Enhanced ICST scheme achieves a lower packet loss rate and a higher peak signal‐to‐noise‐ratio than the traditional SCIT and ICST schemes for video streaming applications.     

Rate Proportional SCFQ Algorithm for High‐Speed Packet‐Switched Networks

Self‐Clocked Fair Queueing (SCFQ) algorithm has been considered as an attractive packet scheduling algorithm because of its implementation simplicity, but it has unbounded delay property in some input traffic conditions. In this paper, we propose a Rate Proportional SCFQ (RP‐SCFQ) algorithm which is a rate proportional version of SCFQ. If any fair queueing algorithm can be categorized into the rate proportional class and input is constrained by a leaky bucket, its delay is bounded and the same as that of Weighted Fair Queueing (WFQ) which is known as an optimal fair queueing algorithm. RP‐SCFQ calculates the timestamps of packets arriving during the transmission of a packet using the current value of system potential updated at every packet departing instant and uses a starting potential when it updates the system potential. By doing so, RP‐SCFQ can have the rate proportional property. RP‐SCFQ is appropriate for high‐speed packet‐switched networks since its implementation complexity is low while it guarantees the bounded delay even in the worst‐case input traffic conditions.     

中继协作无线网络中不完美反馈下基于网络编码的重传方案

无线广播网络传输过程中,目的节点反馈信息丢失或部分丢失导致发送节点不能了解目的节点的真实接收状态.为提高不完美反馈下无线网络的重传效率,本文提出中继协作无线网络中不完美反馈下基于网络编码的重传方案.本方案基于部分可观察马尔科夫决策过程对不完美反馈下的重传过程进行建模.发送节点根据系统观测状态和最大置信度更新系统估计状态,根据数据包发送顺序,优先选择最早丢失且能够恢复最多丢包的编码包重传.目的节点缓存不可解编码包以提升编解码机会.重传过程中源节点关注目的节点请求包需求,相同情况优先选择传输可靠性较高的中继节点,以提升传输有效性.仿真结果表明,在不完美反馈下相对于传统方案,本方案可有效提高重传效率.     

一种低碰撞多传输的水声无线网络MAC协议

针对水声通信网络中长传播时延带来的时空不确定性以及现有水声MAC协议中存在信道预约阶段握手碰撞概率较高的问题,提出了一种碰撞避免并发传输的MAC协议(Collision Avoidance Concurrent Transmission MAC protocol,CACT-MAC)。CACT-MAC协议先由目的节点发起广播测试帧,对信道进行预约。收到该测试帧的源节点通过发出带有并发传输条件的控制包进行并发传输节点的获取,同时这个控制消息还能够为后续数据包的追加传输提供支持。此协议包含一种发送优先级确定机制：根据源、目的节点传播时延与中继数据包数目来确定发送顺序。与DCT-MAC协议和Slotted-FAMA协议相比,所提协议在网络吞吐量上分别提高了5.49%和9.98%,同时在信息控制开销方面分别降低了18.87%和20.56%。     

Performance analysis of CSMA with priority acknowledgments(CSMA/PA) on noisy data networks with finite user population

An analytical procedure is developed to calculate delay and throughput performance of CSMA/PA (carrier sense multiple access with priority acknowledgments). Time-axis slotting and Markov chain analysis are used to determine the channel backlog per cycle. A cycle includes information packet access and transmission time followed by acknowledgment transmission or time-out. Throughput and delay performance are then calculated in terms of the number of network terminals, the network packet error probability, the packet generation rate, and the mean information packet retransmission delay. Fixed-length information and acknowledgment packets are assumed. Calculated results show excellent agreement with measured delay and throughput performance for two distinct five-node intrabuilding power line networks operating at data rates from 1.2 to 9.6 kb/s     

Joint Transmission Rate Control and Opportunistic Network Coding Over Wireless Networks

Existing opportunistic network coding architectures (e.g., COPE) rely on pseudobroadcast to deliver a coded packet to multiple receivers in a single transmission. Only the primary receiver acknowledges the reception by MAC-layer acknowledgements (synchronous ACKs) and the other receivers receive the coded packet by overhearing and acknowledge the reception by asynchronous ACKs, which are usually piggybacked in outgoing data packets. In realistic wireless networks, this mechanism may cause unnecessary retransmissions if asynchronous ACKs are dropped due to packet losses or arrive late and thus compromise the throughput gain brought by network coding. In this paper, we propose a framework of joint rate control and code selection (ORC) to address this issue, aiming at improving the performance gain of opportunistic network coding in wireless networks. The framework of ORC consists of two mechanisms: (1) Rate control: the optimal transmission rate for coded packets is selected by formulating the rate control process as a Finite Horizon Markov Decision Process. (2) Code selection: based on the results of rate selection, the packet combination for forming the coded packet is determined. Numerical results show that ORC can substantially improve the performance gain of opportunistic network coding compared with COPE.     

基于路径时延模型的车联网数据分发方案

针对车联网的容迟特性造成通信资源受限的问题,提出了满足副本抑制要求的数据分发方案.方案利用马尔可夫链,通过交通网络的车辆概率分布建立路段的期望传输时延,并结合车辆的轨迹与目标位置的匹配度确定车辆的转发优先级.车辆为转发的每个数据包插入转发参数字段并通过同步反馈机制确定最终的转发车辆,确保由优先级最高的车辆完成转发.考虑到链路的稳定性,还推导了当前丢包率前提下,车辆接收数据包与发送次数之比,避免不必要的发送尝试产生大量副本.实验结果显示,提出的方案与基于轨迹预测的算法相比,有效提高了网络吞吐量和时延性能.